Science ISU
By:Leo Liao 7/8C
Question: Water is a necessity to all life on Earth. As Earth's human population grows, water becomes more scarce and pollution builds up faster. Are we Canadians going to be able to continue using the same amount of water everyday? If not, how will we use less water or can we increase the quantity of freshwater? How will the effects of water pollution affect water quantity? Can we reverse the effects of water pollution? Will the effect of global warming affect freshwater quantity around the world?
Water Consumption In Canada And Around the World
Canada has a large abundance of fresh water, we have 7% of the world's renewable amount of fresh water after all. We Canadians are one of the top users of water per capita in the world. We Canadians consume an average of 329 litres of water a day. 329 litres is a very large amount of water that's around 164 two litre pop bottles. The average amount of The average amount of water used per day in Africa is only 20 litres. That's 16 and a half times less water than us Canadians use. People in Africa work really hard to get their water by walking long distances just to get the bare minimum amount of water needed for survival. We Canadians on the other hand, turn a switch and freshwater comes out of the tap. This makes accessing freshwater to most Canadians very easy. Whenever we have very easy or non-limited access to resources we generally take a lot more than we need. An example of this was when in grade 5, we were told to build bridges out of popsicle sticks and glue. At the daycare I built the bridge in my spare time. I just kept grabbing and gluing until i was satisfied with the bridge. With no limitations or effort needed to gather the resources, I realized I had used a whole 1000 box of popsicle sticks and two bottles of glue in the end. This could be the same effect that makes us use more water than people who have to work really hard for the minimum amount of water needed. Water consumption in Canada has dropped throughout the years. Consumption of water in Canada has dropped throughout the years. It went from an average of 329 litres per capita to 251 litres per capita, that's a 27% decrease in water usage.
How We Can Increase Our Quantity Of Freshwater
Most of the water on earth is saltwater. So it’s rational to think that converting saltwater to freshwater is a great idea. It’s a good idea, but there's only one issue. Desalination is very costly and usually not worth the amount of money needed. Countries have started trying to use desalination to their advantage. Near Dubai, a solar park has been constructed to distill saltwater. Distillation is the process boiling the water, and catching the steam. This process removes the salt and makes it freshwater. The system can produce 50,000 litres of freshwater in a day. This is a very small number compared to other distillation plants, but many small steps can eventually lead to a world where freshwater can be produced and quantity isn’t an issue. The sudden “boom” in distillation systems is caused because freshwater has been decided as a precious resource, due to the fact that it is becoming scarcer and is a necessity. Technically, if we really wanted freshwater fast, we could cause global warming on purpose to melt the freshwater stored in the ice caps. Melting the ice caps isn’t really a good idea because many issues could occur in the process. Wildlife would be lost, floods would occur, and tons of damage would happen.
How We Can Reduce Our Water Usage In Canada
Water is a limited resource on Earth, we humans use more than we need per day. In Canada, we use a lot of water, but small changes to our lifestyle can reduce the amount of water used per capita in Canada. Most of our water usage is from showering, washing clothes and flushing toilets. Filling a bathtub with water for a bath takes a lot more water than taking a shower for 10 minutes or under. By taking showers instead of baths, we can reduce our water consumption and usage. Washing clothes is another large factor in our water consumption in everyday life. Instead of washing a small batch of clothes everyday, storing clothes and washing it all at once will reduce water consumption greatly. Toilets are another large factor in our water consumption per capita. By using low flush seals toilets we can save more water per flush of a toilet. Leaking taps and running taps can also consume a lot of water over time. Drip by drip the amount adds up and eventually wastes a lot of water. Other leaking water sources will also add to the amount of water wasted. By fixing leaks, less water will be used and more water can be saved. By watering our lawns less often we can also reduce consumption. The saved water can be used and given to areas in drought.
How Global Warming Affects Water Quantity Around The World
As global warming becomes a larger issue, water quantity could be affected. Rising temperatures cause evaporation to occur faster, which makes water levels drop for a long or short period of time. The change in weather patterns will cause many more natural disasters, like hurricanes, tornados and wildfires. These natural disasters can remove water from some places and overfill others. In California, groundwater has been overused there. So when the California drought hit, there was not enough freshwater to sustain everyone there. The drought caused many trees and animals to die, and this could cause global warming to occur faster. Global warming doesn’t only reduce water quantity, but it can increase it. The melting ice will increase our freshwater amount, by about two percent of the world's total water amount (fresh and salty together). That’s a lot of freshwater, but it might not all be used. The sudden increase in water can overfill areas, and contaminate itself with the chemicals disposed on land. Another thing that could happen to the water is that, it gets mixed with salt water and becomes non-freshwater. When the California drought occurred, water management was the law. Wasting water could be fined up to $500, watering lawns was restricted and serving water at restaurants would only be done if requested. With global warming, some areas can be benefited, but others will be affected in a negative way where damage occurs.
Pollution And How It Affects Water Quantity
Polluted water can be very harmful to us humans. With more people on Earth, water will be polluted at a faster rate than before and be used faster. We humans have polluted water for a very long time. In the past, human waste has been dumped into water sources, this caused the water to be contaminated and it spreaded diseases through drinking water. When we realized this issue, we built waste treatment plants to prevent the spread of diseases through drinking water. Even though we treat wastewater, pollution to our freshwater sources has still occurred in our lives today. There are many different ways we pollute our water sources, fracking, pesticides and industrial waste are some of them.
Fracking is a process used to extract natural gas from the Earth. Many chemicals are used and injected into the ground. This creates gaps in the rocks, where gases can escape from it. The chemicals used in the process can be very toxic to humans and other life forms. Since the chemicals are in the ground, it can pollute groundwater that some people rely on. One example of fracking polluting groundwater was when people in Wyoming complained about bad tasting and smelling water. Many tests were done on the water, and methanol, benzene, diesel and other toxic chemicals were found in the water. This shows that our water sources can be polluted through human activity without us knowing, or, if some people knew, they have been ignoring it. Polluting our water sources will shrink the amount of useable freshwater we have on Earth.
Industrial waste is another way we pollute our freshwater sources. Industrial waste can be waste produced by factories, dyes, metals, radioactive waste and sludges. If any of these chemicals get into water, the water can become contaminated and very toxic to living organisms. One example of industrial waste polluting freshwater is the Woburn groundwater contamination incident. Two companies had improperly disposed their industrial waste close to two wells used for drinking water. Trichloroethylene, perchloroethylene and many other solvents leaked into the groundwater used for drinking, this caused higher incidence of leukemia and other illnesses.
Preventing the Pollution
As newer technologies develop, more solutions to pollution will be created. However, this also creates another issue. Newer technologies means newer ways of pollution occurring, due to the newer methods in manufacturing and other breakthroughs. Preventing these contaminations also work as a solution to these issues. By preventing the harmful activities that pollute our freshwater, we can guarantee a way of keeping our freshwater clean. We can prevent pollution to our water sources by maintaining disposal of industrial wastes more strictly. Doing this can reduce the chances of chemicals and other substances making it into the groundwater or freshwater supply. Another way we can prevent pollution to our freshwater sources is by filtering the water before it gets into the taps of households. Activated charcoal is a chemical that can be used to treat polluted water and other substances. It can absorb impurities and clean contaminated water. Bioremediation can be used to break down specific chemicals and purify water even more. Distillation can remove many chemicals under the boiling point of water and kill bacteria. Ultraviolet light can kill germs and bacteria without leaving residue and anything behind. Other chemicals like bromine, iodine and silver can be used to also purify water. In some places of the world, these processes are too costly and expensive to use. Laws can be created to further prevent pollution to water sources, and donations could be made to clean up pollution already done.
Conclusion
We only have a limited amount of water in Canada. Everyone needs a bare minimum amount of freshwater to survive. With Canada’s and the world's population growing, we know that eventually there will be not enough water to sustain that many people with our current water usage right now. No matter how much we increase our freshwater quantity in Canada, there will always be a maximum amount, that the water can support. So in the end, we can only reduce the amount of water we use per capita. To allow more people to use the exact same water source. We can save water by reducing the amount we use daily. Shorter showers, non leaking pipes, more efficient toilets and better planned clothes washings will all reduce our water consumption. Polluting our sources makes the issue worse, which reduces the amount of freshwater we have. We have ways to prevent this pollution and treatments to treat polluted water. Chemicals, ultralight, filters and distillation are some of the different ways we can treat polluted water. Laws can be enforced and made to prevent contamination to our freshwater. Freshwater can be obtained through the distillation of saltwater, which creates more freshwater for us to use. Global warming plays a big role in our future water quantity, if we stop it now we can prevent future issues with our water from happening. In the end, if we don’t find solutions and fix our issues now, small issues will become larger and soon it will be too late to fix problems. With Earth's population of humans growing, we need to reduce water consumption and increase freshwater to continue growing and increasing in population.