WATER ISSUES | CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS

 

70 percent of the earth’s surface is covered with water. 97.5 percent is salt water. The fresh water that humans need to live is far scarcer - not to mention all of the planet’s other plants and animals that cannot survive without fresh water.

Only 2.5 percent of the world’s water is freshwater. Of that, most of the world’s freshwater is not easily accessible or available. A miniscule 0.4 percent exists in surface lakes and rivers and as humidity in the air. Another 30.1 percent is in underground aquifers. The majority, 69.5 percent, is frozen in glaciers, snow, and permafrost.

 

Unequal Access

The United Nations recognizes that one billion people do not have access to clean water - one out of every eight. In 2010, the UN passed the Right to Water and Sanitation, recognizing water as a human right. 2.6 billion more people do not have access to basic sanitation; it is estimated that unsafe drinking water kills more people every year than violence or war.

 

 

 

 

LOCAL CLIMATES ARE CHANGING

 

GLOBAL WARMING

 

Climate Change

As burning fossil fuels heats up the atmosphere, local climates are changing, often for the worse. In some areas, rainfall is disappearing, raising the specter of drought and crop failures; and in other areas, abnormally heavy rainfall has produced catastrophic flooding.

Water Footprint has become an essential indicator of direct and indirect water use around the globe. This tool gives us a better understanding of how consumption of goods and services and production chains relate to water use and impacts on fresh-water systems.

 

HYDRO-FRACKING

 

At the very time when we should be reducing the burning of fossil fuels to slow down global warming, the world’s oil producers are rapidly expanding fracking. In order to produce more natural gas and oil, drillers are forcing millions of gallons of toxic-chemical-laden water down wells into rock formations at high pressure. There are virtually no regulations addressing fracking, but EPA scientists have already found contamination of underground water supplies.