Importance and Availability of Water

Importance of Water

• Water is essential for all life.
• It is a prerequisite for social well-being and economic productivity.
• Good quality water should be maintained for the entire population.
• Protection of the hydrological, biological, and chemical functions of ecosystems is key.
• 24% of water usage is for toilets.
• 20% of water usage is for showers.
• 19% of water usage is for faucets.
• 17% of water usage is for clothes washers. Water is required for drinking, daily activities, fish/fodder & agriculture, and industry.
• Water also has religious & recreational uses
• Water is needed to recharge ground water, control floods, support wild life and to adapt to climate change
• Water has aesthetic qualities for visual, audial, tactual, psycho logical reasons

Water Availability

• Available freshwater is being unsustainably wasted and polluted.
• It can become overcharged, particularly when it comes to the price for this irreplaceable natural resource!
• 1 in 6 people lack sufficient access to clean water. This situation will likely worsen.

Water Facts

• 1.1 billion people globally do not have access to improved water supply sources.
• 2.4 billion people lack access to improved sanitation facilities.
• Roughly 2 million people die each year from diarrheal diseases, with most being children under 5.
• Globally, 1 in 5 deaths of children under 5 are caused by a water-related disease.
• Over 783 million people on the planet lack access to clean drinking water.
• Over 700,000 children in Africa die annually from unsafe drinking water.
• Only three-tenths of a percent of water on Earth is usable.
• Between 50 to 100 liters of water per person per day are needed for basic needs.
• The water source needs to be within 1,000 meters from home.
• Collection time needed should not exceed 30 minutes.
• Water costs should not exceed 3% of household income.

Water Distribution

• All Water on Earth is 97% Saline.
• All Water on Earth is 3% Freshwater.
• 30.1% of freshwater is Groundwater.
• 0.9% of freshwater is other sources.
• 68.7% of freshwater is Icecaps and Glaciers
• 0.3% of freshwater is Surface water.
• 87% of surface water is Lakes
• 2% of surface water is Rivers.
• Swamps compromise 11% of surface water.

Freshwater Shortages

• Causes of water scarcity includes dry climates, drought, too many people, and wasting water.
• By 2050, 60 countries will have face water stress.
• 1 in 7 people do not have regular access to clean water.
• Potential international conflicts could result over water scarcity issues.

Increasing Water Supplies

• Groundwater used to supply cities and grow food is pumped from aquifers faster than it can be replenished by precipitation.
• Using dams, reservoirs, and transport systems to provide water to arid regions has increased water supplies but has also disrupted ecosystems and displaced people.
• Salty ocean water can be converted to freshwater, however the cost is high, and the resulting salty brine needs to be disposed of without harm to aquatic or terrestrial ecosystems.
• Actions to increase freshwater supplies are:
  • Withdrawing groundwater
  • Dams and reservoirs
  • Transporting surface water
  • Desalination
  • Water conservation

The Water Cycle

• Major parts of the water cycle includes:
  • Water Storage in ice and snow
  • Water Storage in the atmosphere
  • Condensation
  • Precipitation
  • Sublimation
  • Evapotranspiration
  • Evaporation
  • Surface runoff
  • Snowmelt runoff to streams
  • Infiltration
  • Streamflow
  • Spring
  • Freshwater storage
  • Ground-water discharge
  • Ground-water storage
  • Water storage in oceans

Water Supply Types

• Rainwater
• Ground water
• Surface water
• Level 1 - point source: A protected well or a developed spring with an outlet but without a distribution system
• Level 2 - communal faucet system: System composed of a source, reservoir, piped distribution network, and communal faucets at a ratio of 1 faucet to 4 households.
• Level 3 - waterworks system: System with a source, reservoir, piped distribution network, and household taps for densely populated urban areas

Types of Water

• Mineral Water: Distinguished from other bottled water types by its constant level and relative proportions of mineral and trace elements at emergence point.
• Purified Water: Bottled water produced by distillation, deionization, reverse osmosis or another suitable process.
• Distilled Water: Undergoes the same process as purified water but is vaporized and condensed afterwards.

Water Use Sustainability

• Water can be used more sustainably by cutting water waste, raising water prices and slowing population growth.
• It can also be accomplished by protecting aquifers, forests, and other ecosystems that store and release water.
• Per Capita Water Usage in the UAE is 550 Litres Per Person Per Day!
• 82% of Per Capita Water Usage in the UAE is More than the Global Average.
• With more than 9.3 million people in the UAE, this results in a total wastage of over 1 Trillion Litres Per Year.
• Using a water efficient shower head saves water.
• Taking shorter showers saves water.
• Fixing leaking faucets saves water.
• Turning water off while brushing teeth, shaving, washing your face and washing dishes all saves water.

Reducing Water Waste

• It's possible to increase the cost of water use, end subsidies for wasteful water use and provide subsidies for efficient water use practices.
• Efficiency of irrigation can be approved with center pivots, low-pressure sprinklers, precision sprinklers and drip irrigation.
• Waste solutions should involve less home and business use.
• Sustainable water use can be waste less.
• Don't deplete aquifers to promote water conservation and subsidization..
• Preserve water quality and safeguard forests, wetlands, mountain glaciers, watersheds, and natural systems that store and release water.
• Establish agreements among regions and nations sharing surface water resources and raise water prices while diminishing population growth.
• Irrigation water waste can be reduced by lining canals that bringing water to irrigation ditches by using treated waste water.
• This can also be reduced by irrigating at night to reduce evaporation
• Only monitoring soil before adding water, growing several crops on land (polyculture) and by encouraging organic farming and non-thirsty crops.
• Wash only fill loads of clothes or use the lowest possible water-level setting for smaller loads.
• Limit use "grey" water for watering lawns and washing cars, use a bucket to wash a car, and find which car washes recycle water.
• Water can be saved replacing lawns with native plants that minimize or eliminate watering, do water lawns and plants during early morning or late evenings, and implementing drip irrigation and mulch for gardens and flowers.

Removing Salt from Seawater

• Major problems with desalination exist:
  • High Costs
  • Result in Death of marine organisms
  • Cause Large quantity of brine wastes

Floods

• Floods are deadly and destructive.
• Human activities worsen floods
• Failing dams and water diversion causes flooding
• Predicted increased climate change results in more coastal flooding

Reducing Flood Threat

• Lessening the threat of flooding can come from protecting wetlands and natural vegetation in watersheds and by not building in areas subject to frequent flooding.

Benefits of Floodplains

• Benefits of Floodplains include highly productive wetlands, natural flood and erosion control, and they maintain high water quality.
• They are useful for the soil fertility, recharge groundwater, nearby rivers for recreational use and farming, and flatlands for Urbanization and farming.

Flood Damage: Prevention and Control

• Prevention: Preserve forests on watersheds.
• Prevention: Preserve and restore wetlands in floodplains.
• Prevention: Tax development on floodplains.
• Prevention: Use floodplains primarily to recharge aquifers, as well as for sustainable agriculture and forestry.
• Control: Straighten and deepen streams (channelization).
• Control: Build levees or floodwalls along streams.
• Control: Build dams.

Water Pollution Action

• Streams can cleanse most pollutants, if they are not overloaded or reduced flows.
• Reducing water pollution can come from prevention, working with nature to treat sewage, reducing resource use and waste, reducing poverty, and slowing population growth.

Water Pollution

• Introduction of chemical, physical, or biological material, impacting water quality and living organisms
• Ranges from dissolved or suspended solids to discharge of toxic pollutants (pesticides, heavy metals, nondegradable, bioaccumulative chem. compounds)

Water Pollution Types

• Direct (Point source)
  • Occurs when a polluting substance is emitted directly into the waterway.
    • Ex: pipe spewing toxic chemicals directly into a river
• Indirect (Non-point source).
  • Occurs when there is runoff of pollutants into a waterway.
  • Fertilizer from a field is carried into a stream by surface runoff.
  • Cumulative effect of small amounts of contaminants gathered from a large area.
• Other examples include; domestic sewage, agricultural runoff, industrial effluents

Water Pollution: Types and Effects

• Infectious agents (pathogens) causing diseases from bacteria, viruses, protozoa, parasites found in human and animal wastes.
• Results in Unsuitable water for drinking, recreation, agriculture, and industry
• Diminishes the aesthetic quality of lakes and rivers
• Results in Contaminated water destroys aquatic life and reduces its reproductive ability
• Eventually, it becomes a hazard to human health
• Oxygen-demanding wastes deplete dissolved oxygen needed by aquatic species. Example biodegradable animal wastes and plant debris.
• Plant Nutrients causes excessive growth of Algae and other species involving Sewage, Animal wastes, and Inorganic fertilizers.
• Organic chemicals involving oil, gasoline, plastics, pesticides and cleaning solvents, add toxins to water.
• Sediments disrupts photosynthesis, food webs, and other processes from Soil, silt and land erosion.
• Heavy Metals will cause cancer, disrupt immune and endocrine systems like Lead Mercury and Arsenic from landfills, household and industrial waste.
• Thermal Pollution makes some species vulnerable to disease and include Heat from power plants and industrial causes.

Water-Borne Diseases

• caused by pathogenic microorganisms that most commonly are transmitted in contaminated fresh water
• Causes:
  • Lack of proper sanitation (sewage treatment being inadequate, coupled with human wastes disposed in open canals)
  • Infection with pathogenic microorganism: Cholera, Typhoid, Amoebic Bacillary dysentery

Water-Washed Diseases

• caused by reduced personal hygiene and skin or eye contact with contaminated water; thrive in conditions where freshwater is scarce, and sanitation bad
  • Scabies, trachoma and flea; lice and tick-borne diseases and conjunctivitis, leptospirosis

Related Diseases

• Caused by insect vectors reproducing in water
• Causes:
  • Lack of appropriate water management and engineering projects, and increased mosquito breeding
  • Dengue, filariasis, malaria & trypanosomiasis
• Based diseases: from parasites found in intermediate animal in water
• Causes:
  • Stagnant water with dams and water tanks is ideal for snails, lack of good hygiene. Schistosomiasis, Dracunculiasis

Ocean Pollution

• Coastal areas are highly productive ecosystems: occupied by > 40% of all population, and could double by 2050!
• About 80% marine pollution originates on land, which causes ocean dumping, algal blooms and oxygen depletion.

Oil Pollution: Effects and Solutions for Ocean Ecosystems

• Volatile organic hydrocarbons: Can cause kill larvae, destroy natural insulation and buoyancy of birds and mammals.
• Heavy oil: Sinks and kills bottom organisms and coral reefs
• Oil cleanup methods exist:
• Current methods recover no more than 15%.
• Most effective measure is prevention.
  • Involves Control runoff and double-hull tankers

Characteristics of Water

• Physical:
  • Inert suspensions of floating substances that are carried by water as part of the hydrologic cycle (rainfall, percolation, runoff, evaporation).
  • Turbidity pertains to a measure of light-transmitting and the properties of water comprised of suspended matter.
  • Color is caused by substances also found in a solution
  • Taste and odor is attributable to biological components.
• Chemical: Being organic, and inorganic, includes chemicals, and affects water's aesthetics.
  • It impacts domestic use as well as in commercial and other commercial and industrial endeavors.
  • pH or alkalinity, is found in capacity and presence of ions (6.5 – 8.5 pH).
  • Hardness derives from Calcium and Magnesium: indicator for potential rain calcium carbonate, and for industries reliant on cleaning and sterilization.
  • Salinity indicates possible sewage pollution.
• Biological: Focuses upon the presence of microorganisms, parasites, microscopic plants and animals.
  • 0-8 = clean water
  • 8-20 = slightly polluted
  • 20-60 = polluted water
  • 60-100 = grossly polluted water
• Radiological

Radiological Characteristics

• Can come from Result of nuclear weapons testing and man-made substances. It may also enter drinking water from facilities, mining or plants.

Water Quality Parameters

• Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD)
• Chemical oxygen demand
• Total solids
• Coliforms
• Nitrogen and phosphorus compounds
• Heavy metals
• Oil and grease
• pH
• Temperature

Biological Oxygen Demand

• BOD indicates amount of biodegradable organic waste in municipal and other industrial contexts
• BOD measures the amount of O2 consumed through the process of decomposing organic compounds
• The work put in determines the levels of BOD and the O@ left throughout the water supply

Indicators of Water Quality

• A reading between of 1–2 mg/L is very good which means there will not be much organic matter.
• 3–5 mg/L is fair or moderately clean.
• 6–9 mg/L is poor or somewhat polluted, which indicates that organic matter is decomposing.
• above 100mg/L or more the water is listed as Very Poor: as it is Very Polluted with high organic matter content.

Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD)

• COD tests wastewater that contains non-biodegradable compounds/compounds that inhabit microbial activity
• High amounts indicate higher risks for aquatic ecosystems
• This test is applied to extract measurements of organic deposits w/i a supply

Total Solids (TS)

• Refers to material suspended/dissolved in water
• Includes total suspended/dissolved solids, with a high TS, indicating problems and poor aquatic function

Choliforms

• Choliforms can exist in the water
• An abundance indicates higher risk for ecological damage
• Sources come from septic tanks animal failure, or damage to municipal sewage structures

Measures Contaminant and Biological Damage

• Essential microbes promote growth with other native wildlife

Contaminants

• Toxins can include arsenic, cadmium, lead etc.
• Heavy metals also affect the environment:
• Arsenic total, mercury, cadmium, organophosphate chromium, cyanide and lead
• These all cause damaged to plant and animal health.

Preventative Measures

• Control the safety of water via surveys, samples, and treatments
• Quality control measures should meet local safety standards

Purification

• Natural and artificial selection is applied to produce and remove pollutants. Natural events include evaporation, aeration, gravity and biological processes etc.

Water Treatment

• In rural areas septic tanks exist, and are used as primary and/or secondary sewage treatments
• These structures are used as a means of filtration, as they apply physical actions, disinfection and/or extraction of contaminants and or/pathogens

Improve Sewage Treatment

• Improving systems should be done through eliminating contaminants, use wetlands, and eliminate use of excess toxic products
• To this end, governments can mandate safer processing and fines for unsafe practices

Home Safety

• At home, households can filter and/or boil drinking water
• Use safe products to reduce pollution, and avoid commercial products, which can lead to pollution and biohazards

Preventative Steps

• Apply compost to water sources, and compost/protect watersheds.

Protective Measures

• Protective measures can be: Standards for safe drinking-water and an evaluation of chemicals
• All must connect to state laws, sites, and delivery of water for consumers. Plans for testing and water treatment are essential
• Water distribution lines must be monitored and tested, and there should be no water connections to areas with low pressure.

Pollution Prevention

• Prevent pollutants with new farming practices
• Use native composts
• Protect watersheds and ground water
• This should eliminate any toxins, hazardous materials, or chemical discharges from water ways.