I thought water was everywhere.
Understanding how one of Earth's most seemingly ubiquitous substances can be so scarce
Click the Globe
- 70% of Earth is covered in water.
- Of this, only 3% of Earth's water is not salt water,including lakes, water vapor, groundwater, glaciers, etc.
- Still, just 1.75% of Earth's water is freshwater.
- To make matters worse, a majority of the water is frozen,
leaving only .01% of Earth's water accessible for human use.
A limited supply with a growing demand.
The result?
Tons of Freshwater Used Today Worldwide (Demand):
*Worldwide, this amounts to more than 4 trillion tons of water per year.
To put this in perspective, that's equivalent to 50 Olympic-sized swimming pools every second.
Number of People in Need of Water Worldwide:
This has tangible consequences for our future.
Child Deaths from Contaminated Water Use/Water Scarcity Today:
*Contaminated water puts children at high risk for diseases such as diarrhea, cholera, dysentery, typhoid, and polio. For example, diarrhea accounts for more than 361,000 deaths of children under the age of 5.