The World's Water Supply

The amount of water on Earth hasn't really changed since the planets' formation from solar gasses some 4.5 billion years ago - though quite a bit of it arrived here from the early bombardment of ice-laden comets.

There are over 3 billion billion billion billion gallons of water on the planet all told. This amount of water is kept constant due the continuous water (or hydrologic) cycle of the earth. As rain falls, it fills the lakes and rivers which flow into the sea where it evaporates into the air as water vapour, forms into clouds and deposits it back again as rainfall.

Oceans contain about 98% of the total amount of water on earth, with 1.6% of the remaining 2% being locked up in the polar ice caps and glaciers. About 0.36% of the remaining 0.4% is situated underground in aquifers and wells, and 0.01% is in the form of water vapor in the form of clouds, mist and humidity with just 0.03% in our lakes, rivers and reservoirs.

The problem for humans is that most of our water is saline and is of little use to us. Marine life depends on salt water to survive so humans must not intervene too much. The reason for the sea's salinity in the first place is that the Earths' rocks contain sodium and chlorine ions which are collected by the acidic rain (rain that has absorbed some carbon from the atmosphere) and then eventually washed into the sea. In addition to the sodium chloride added to the oceans in this way, the sea beds are continually producing salt via underwater eruptions. Evaporation of the sea leaves the salt behind, thus the oceans always remain salty and may be increasing in salinity. The sea does, however, get rid of a lot of its salt due to the millions of sea creatures that absorb it and after they die, there bones and shells finish up on the sea bed as sediment. Eventually this sediment turns into rock and, where it has risen above sea level over millions of years, this sedimentary rock - in particular limestone - gets absorbed by rainwater and is eventually washed back into the sea.

As a result of the growing world population, wastage and industrial use there is a shortage of fresh water on a global scale - the average water consumption in the West is more than 30 gallons per person per day. Desalination plants would appear to offer some answer to water shortages but whilst they produce some 0.3% of the Earths' fresh water supply, they are simply not energy efficient at the moment.

The big problem for life dependent on both fresh water and salt water is of course pollution, and whilst the Earths' water remains constant, its quality is quite another matter. Pollution of the world's water supply from industrial processes and agriculture is a problem that needs to be resolved soon - and quickly.


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