As of Aug 2012, nearly 63% of the contiguous US was experiencing drought conditions. ((Real-time drought data – US Geological Survey (USGS) )) At the peak, 77% of the Central Region was experiencing moderate to exceptional drought.
21st Century Pollution
Unearthed: The Fracking Facade
A video exposing a flawed claim often abused in the sales pitch for promoting shale gas development across the world:
“With a history of 60 years, after nearly a million wells drilled, there are no documented cases that hydraulic fracturing (fracking) has lead to the contamination of groundwater.”
The Great Culling
Five Things You Should Know About Fluoride in Your Drinking Water
Fluoridation has been a public policy for so long that most people simply take it for granted. However, increasingly, scientists and public health officials are questioning just why this nationwide fluoridation needs to take place and what the long-term consequences of this will be. Read below to find out five things you should know about the fluoride in your drinking water.
5 things you need to know about sanitation & drinking water
The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation was established in 1990 and has monitored changes in national, regional and global coverage ever since. The latest JMP report, Progress on Sanitation and Drinking Water: 2015 Update and MDG Assessment, looks at how far we have come in the past 25 years and how far we still have to go to achieve universal access post-2015.
Solar-Powered Distiller: Turns Salt Water Into Drinking Water
There are so many things we inhabitants of the Western world take for granted and one of them is fresh clean drinking water. In the underdeveloped nations of the world, native women travel for miles to local rivers and transport clean water back to their villages in baskets on their heads. The lack of potable water is the cause of typhoid fever and other dreaded maladies stemming from environmental neglect and abject poverty.
Water Quality in a Drought
The Great California Drought: It’s been all over the news lately that California is getting into more and more trouble with the continuing drought and dwindling water supply. Not enough people are conserving it, crops need it and enforcing conservation is extremely difficult. While everyone is concerned about the amount of water being used, few people think about the quality of water being used.
17 year old girl invents a device that creates fresh water and clean energy
Meet Cynthia Sin Nga Lam from Melbourne, Australia. This amazing 17 year old girl may just have created a machine that could dig her predecessors out of a massive hole they dug for themselves with the lack of sustainable and economical living in the past.
Miss Lam put her innovative device into the running for Google’s 2014 Science Fair. This device not only cleans contaminated water, but also uses the contaminants removed from the water to catalyse electrolysis in order to release hydrogen as a byproduct to be used in fuel cells to generate electricity, which, in turn, creates more clean water. Amazing, right?!
Electricity and clean water are two vital things that we easily have access to, but are sadly seen as luxury elements in the lives for those in underdeveloped countries.
Titled “H2Pro”, Cynthia Sin Naga Lam’s ingenious invention should create a more than affordable method for millions to gain access to clean water and electricity. Her submission to Google’s Science Fair competition lays out the project, which first originated from her interest in photocatalytic processes (which are processes driven primarily by light energy). Keep in mind that this brilliant invention rose from the creative
future of drinking water
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch
your water isn’t safe
Bottled Water? Really?
all tap water comes from sewage
Water Security
The Disappearing Male
The Disappearing Male is about one of the most important, and least publicized, issues facing the human species: the toxic threat to the male reproductive system.
Chasing Water
Photographer Peter McBride traveled along the Colorado River from its source high in the Rocky Mountains to its historic mouth at the Sea of Cortez. In this Yale Environment 360 video, he follows the natural course of the Colorado by raft, on foot, and overhead in a small plane, telling the story of a river whose water is siphoned off at every turn, leaving it high and dry 80 miles from the sea.
In the video, McBride, a Colorado native, documents how increasing water demands have transformed the river that is the lifeblood for an arid Southwest.
America’s Most Endangered Rivers® 2013
| 1. Colorado River Outdated water management is threatening recreation, water supply, and wildlife habitat. |
2. Flint River Water supply for communities, farms, recreation, and wildlife are threatened by outdated water management. |
3. San Saba River The river’s flow for ranchers, citizens, and lakes might disappear from outdated water management. |
| 4. Little Plover River Outdated water management is putting fish habitat and water supply at risk. |
5. Catawba River Coal ash pollution is threatening drinking water and recreation. |
6. Boundary Waters Copper and nickel mining at putting recreation, drinking water, and wilderness at risk. |
| 7. Black Warrior River Coal mining will put drinking water quality and fish and wildlife habitat at risk. |
8. Rough & Ready and Baldface Creeks Nickel mining endangering pristine rivers, wilderness, botanical diversity and recreation. |
9. Kootenai River Open-pit coal mining is endangering water quality and survival of rare fish and wildlife. |
| 10. Niobrara River Improper sediment management is putting property, crops, and public safety at risk of flooding. |
Special Mention: Merced River Intentional flooding of this Wild & Scenic River would harm wildlife habitat and recreation. |
How Earth Made Us
The incredible story of the natural forces that have shaped our history presented by Professor Iain Stewart. Our planet has amazing power, and yet that’s rarely mentioned in our history books.
This series tells the story of how the Earth has influenced human history, from the dawn of civilization to the modern industrial age. It reveals for the first time on television how geology, geography and climate have been a far more powerful influence on the human story than has previously been acknowledged. Visiting spectacular locations in Iceland, the Middle East and India, Iain shows how control over water has been central to human existence.
Sacred Spirit of Water
Water is a living organism, water is sacred, water is life, water is worth defending and protecting for those yet unborn. Rivers and lakes in Alberta don’t stop at provincial borders. These rivers and lakes flow throughout Canada and the United States, therefore everyone will be affected by the ominous bills which have become law.
All Dry on the Western Front
2013 was a dry year for California, but it has nothing on 2014 so far. January is on track to be California’s driest on record, and since the state receives half of its precipitation between December and February, it appears that the 2013-2014 water year could be the driest on record too. With that possibility in view, California governor, Edmund G. Brown, Jr. declared a state of emergency on January 17, urging Californians to conserve water.
From brown landscapes to the bare mountains, California is clearly dry in this view from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite, taken on January 18, 2014. The lower image, taken on January 18, 2013, contrasts last year’s drought conditions with the extreme conditions currently in place.
The Story of Bottled Water
What is in Your Water?
USA Today exposes America’s Dirty Little Secret
Washington—Each and every year, more than 860 billion gallons of raw and partially treated sewage is dumped into America’s waters and most people don’t even know it. It’s enough sewage to cover a state the size of Pennsylvania ankle deep. A shocking story in USA Today exposed America’s Dirty little secret, among the findings:
Washington—Each and every year, more than 860 billion gallons of raw and partially treated sewage is dumped into America’s waters and most people don’t even know it. It’s enough sewage to cover a state the size of Pennsylvania ankle deep. A shocking story in USA Today exposed America’s Dirty little secret, among the findings:
10 Reasons You Should Be Prepared with Pure Drinking Water
The amazing stories emerging from the devastated North East Coast of the US remind us all how large and destructive these major storms can be. The area affected is as large as Europe according to a Fox News report. So the rescue and support efforts have to reach millions of people in a very short time. You are best to prepare for self-sufficiency.
1. You and your family can only live for a few days without water.
2. Drinking severely contaminated water can cause serious illness, and even death
3. Bottled water disappears from store shelves within hours of a disaster.
4. Bottled water re-supply to store shelves may not be possible for days, even weeks.
5. Bottled water plants may be out of operation after a disaster
6. Bottled water delivery can be stopped if roads are not usable.
7. You can’t rely on FEMA, government and your local utilities in all emergencies.
8. Earthquakes can destroy underground piping infrastructure disrupting water supplies.
9. In winter temperatures pipes can burst due to freezing, thus jeopardizing water supplies
10. Water supplies can be contaminated with sewage in an emergency
Preparing for an emergency is wise. Make sure you have your water emergency plan in place before an emergency arises.
FEMA and the Red Cross as well as the American Water Works Association (AWWA) recommend that in an emergency you should use distilled water. Distilled water undergoes prolonged boiling thus eliminating the biological contaminants and is of very high purity.
Here are some suggestions:
- Have a distiller with a large storage tank, and keep the storage tank full at all times.
- Fit you distiller with a pressure tank. This allows you to get stored distilled water from the storage tank even if the power fails.
- Have an emergency distiller on hand.
Store bottled water. Glass containers are better than plastic bottled; plasticizers leach from the plastic over time.
Posted Nov 13 2012 by Al Meder – Watercology