Water… a limited resource?
If you asked somebody a few years ago that people would be spending money “buying” water at the local store, you would have been tarred and feathered – labeled a lunatic. Pure water is a limited resource considering all the waste and pollution we throw into it on a daily basis- that is if you’re lucky enough to be born with easy access to water in the first place.
Water starts off “clean” but because it’s often abused as a dumping ground, our tax dollars must be used to clean it up just so it can become fit for consumption. Most cities have crumbling infrastructures, the water that leaves the water treatment plant may be all nice and dandy- but after traveling miles through city then building pipes- that water picks up lots of stuff. So where does that leave us? Crops, animals and fish don’t have access to treated water but we need to consume them to live. So maybe our water is “clean” but the food we eat isn’t getting any better.
Sure the world is covered in vast Oceans but realize this, only 1% of that water is easily accessible to humans, the rest is salt water or caught up in glaciers/water cycles.
If you look at the forthcoming century ahead of us you will see the growing importance of water. From Los Vegas modifying their water use policy to Israel having disputes with Lebanon over water rights and even China apologizing just this week to Russia for the growing catastrophe that a chemical plant explosion caused after releasing 100 tons of benzene into the Songhua River. It’s about time people start to realize how inter-dependent we all are on water.
Water doesn’t require a passport to cross into another country, so next time you take a drink of water- don’t take it for granted.
97.5 Salt Water
2.5% Fresh Water (of which):
- 68.9% is trapped in glaciers/snow
- 29.9% ground water
- 0.9% is soil moisture
- 0.3% found in lakes & rivers (only part renewable)
No Comments »
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL
