Water Crisis - The Global Concern

Water is very essential element for the existence of all living things. We use water in all our daily activities like cooking, washing, cleaning, farming, in the industries and in nearly every aspect of life. 97% of the total water on the planet earth is found in the oceans and seas. 2% of the remaining is present as icebergs in the polar ice caps and only the remaining 1% constitute all the all the fresh water in the hydrological cycle including the ground water reserves. Only 0.002% of all the total water is available as fresh water in rivers, lakes and streams - suitable for human consumption. Of the available water 70% is used for agriculture, 20% is used in the industries and factories and 10% is used for domestic purposes. Why are we staring at this crisis in the first place? There are numerous reasons as to why we are losing the available water and a few are listed

1. Misuse of available water - both domestic and industrial. A huge volume of water is wasted domestically. Industries are the major concern where there is a lot of toxic sewage water. This water is deposited as wastage in the lakes and rivers thus polluting these sources too. Pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, bacteria, chemicals, medical and radio active waste are dumped into the rivers and lakes. This causes excess growth of algae which in turn robs water of its oxygen supply. This not only pollutes the water source but also destroys marine life.

2. Deforestation - One of the major effects of modernization that has left its scar on the planet. Globally a lot of forests are razed to give way to expanding civilization. The result of this is that rain forests are destroyed the rainfall has diminished globally resulting in water shortage.

3. Global warming - Ozone Layer depletion, another major factor fuelling the crisis is the global warming. Due to this the Ozone layer is getting depleted by dangerous gases like chlorine, bromine and other Chlorofluorocarbons emissions. This allows UV and other dangerous rays to enter earths atmosphere and increase the temperature. Thus leading to global warming and greater rate of water evaporation.

4. Greenhouse effect - Gases like water vapour, nitrous oxide, water vapour, nitrous oxide forms a gas cover over the earths atmosphere thus trapping the heat and infrared radiations within. This increases the temperature thus increasing the rate water evaporation.

To save the world, a conscious effort must be taken by every government, corporate and every individual to minimise the rate at which water is disappearing or becoming unusable. Some tips can be

1. Properly educating everyone on global warming and their individual responsibilities.

2. Educate people on good water usage practices, importance of water recycling and water harvesting. Also enforcing strict water recycling and pollution control among industries.

3. All government should take measures to contain deforestation and organize, with the help of the corporate and private sector organizations, more aforestation drives and set up desalination plants to convert sea water into usable water.

4. Reduce dependence on plastics, chemical fertilizers and pesticides thus controlling pollution and use more re-usable products.

Most importantly it is very necessary for each and every one of us to do our part in the conservation of water for ourselves and for our future generations before it is too late.

References:

1. Wikipedia -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_crisis

2. The Ramsar convention on Wetland -
http://www.ramsar.org/wn/w.n.3wwf_wwf3.htm

3. http://www.globalwater.org/

4. General reference (not used for this article) http://www.worldwatercouncil.org/index.php?id=25