As our population in the United States grows we have a greater and greater need for fresh water supplies. But only 3% of the Earths water is fresh, the rest is in the oceans and cannot be used for drinking water without a desalination process taking place first. Most of the fresh water on Earth is underground in aquifers and the rest is in rivers, lakes and streams and floating or swirling around in the sky in the form of clouds. Some believe that Hurricanes are terrible disasters to our economic engine and very costly to our nations treasury, this of course cannot be debated after the most recent onslaught of Hurricanes in the record breaking 2005 Hurricane Season with Katrina, Rita and Wilma. But did you know that long-term droughts in our nation have cost our economic productivity and output more by a factor of ten than the recent Hurricanes? It is true. As we expand our populations we are finding that relatively minor drought seasons become major catastrophes and mild years of rainfall or snow pack become exacerbated because we are using more water than is being cycled through the system. You see the problem is, we as Americans are taking our water for granted and we are not conserving this vital resource. We should not waste water, because we will need it later. Even in wet years all it seems to do is barely catch us up even or bring us out of an extreme drought water supply into a tolerable situation. If you want to help the problem be a good steward of our water supplies and conserve water. Think on this. |
