Ally |1 Afeefah Ally Mr.

Gomez ENG4U1 29 May 2011 Human Ingenuity: The Destruction of the Earths Blue Gold There is no doubt that the Earths fresh water supply is diminishing each and everyday. While the Earth has almost 326 million trillion gallons of water, less than one percent of that water supply is available for use.1 Even so, humans continue to exploit this valuable and essential resource with little thought to the impending consequences if, the seemingly infinite supply of freshwater, were to run out. With more than two billion people living in water-stressed regions of the world and more children being killed from dirty water than war, malaria, HIV/AIDS and traffic accidents combined, it is no surprise that the water crisis is slowly being acknowledged on a global scale. Understanding the different types of water storage is essential to understanding the global water crisis. Water catchments are areas where all water flows to a common destination, bounded by a line of terrain where water flows elsewhere.2 Groundwater, on the other hand, is water located beneath the ground surface in soil pore spaces and in the fractures of rock formations. A unit of rock or an unconsolidated deposit is called an aquifer when it can yield a usable quantity of water. The depth at which soil pore spaces in rock become completely saturated with water is called the water table. Groundwater is recharged from, and eventually flows to, the surface naturally; natural discharge often occurs at springs and seeps, and can form oases or wetlands.3

Ally |2 When any of these, whether groundwater, aquifers, water catchments or water tables or their environment is disturbed the consequences are often serious and lasting. However, human ingenuity has been largely blamed for the depletion of fresh water across the world, with many technological advancements and human innovations resulting in serious and often lasting effects on water systems, ground reserves and the surrounding environment. As a result, the depletion of the worlds fresh water supplies and the impending destruction is a result of several contributing human factors including damming, deforestation and the diversion of water sources in various parts of the globe. The damming of rivers across the world has inadvertently become one of the main reasons for the ongoing depletion and impending destruction of the worlds fresh water supplies. Dams are built for several reasons: to facilitate navigation; to create reservoirs for cities; to provide agricultural irrigation; to provide hydroelectricity; and to control flooding. 4 As a result, there are more than forty-five thousand large dams (higher than fifteen meters) that have been built around the world.5 On a global scale, most nations have constructed these dams with little thought to the fact that people do not only need water for electricity and farming but also for basic survival. However, once the symbol of human mastery over nature, these dams have become quite controversial as evidence of their substantial impact on fresh water supplies continues to accumulate. First of all, dams multiply the surface area of water exposed to the sun which in hot climates can lead to the evaporation of huge quantities of water. For instance, according to Blue Gold: the Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water, around 170 cubic kilometers (about 40 cubic miles) of water evaporates from the worlds reservoirs every year, almost one-tenth of the total amount of fresh water consumed by all the worlds major human activities.6 With less than one percent of the worlds total water supplies being usable

Ally |3 freshwater, this translates into a significant amount of freshwater loss, especially when taking into account that water scarcity is a grave issue. Dams also play a crucial role in the alteration of the flow, and sometime the temperature of rivers which almost always leads to elevated salt levels in the surrounding soil. 7Consequently, the local groundwater becomes contaminated and can no longer be used as a fresh water source for the community. In addition, dams also greatly affect the nutrient content of both the local watersheds and surrounding soil. Helen Sarakinos, the Dams Programs Manager of River Alliance Wisconsin explains, One of the main functions of rivers is to carry nutrients from one place to another. Those nutrients which are really critical to the health of an entire watershed, becomes completely and wholly interrupted when you build a dam. 8 Dammed rivers fail to carry such minerals and nutrients downstream through the watershed resulting in even more soil erosion, less percolation when it rains, more run-off and thus an increase in the depletion of the worlds fresh water supplies. Deforestation is yet another reason for the ongoing depletion and imminent destruction of the worlds fresh water supplies. Deforestation, the clearing of the Earth's forests on a massive scale,9 is speeding up despite the fact that it throws the entire water system out of balance. With more than 14.5 million hectares of the worlds forests disappearing every year10, the fresh water supplies are being severely damaged because forests play a crucial role in the protection and purification of these supplies. For instance, forests absorb any pollutants before they run off into lakes and rivers11 thus protecting watersheds from pollution, caused by chemicals from agriculture, industry, or heavy concentrations of organic matter. 12 However, with the decimation of forests, there is no means by which these pollutants are being absorbed. As a result, they flow

Ally |4 directly into lakes and rivers and consequently into the groundwater, aquifers and watersheds resulting in the loss of the entire local freshwater system.

Furthermore, deforestation also destroys a water catchments ability to retain water13 since forests act kind of like a sponge. They soak up rainfall while also anchoring soils and releasing water at regular intervals. For instance, Maude Barlow the founder of the Blue Planet Project explains how deforestation in Mexico City has led to the water crisis it faces today. It [Mexico City] was once an oasis of water but when the Spanish came, they didnt want their new city to look like Venice, they wanted it to look like Madrid. So, they used slave labor to cut down all the trees that would protect the water sources and then dredged the water systems. What happened was that they just destroyed the water table and of course that was one thing when there were 10, 000 people living there but it is another when there is 25 million today.14 As a result, the Mexico City now pipes freshwater more than 16 thousand liters a second- into the city from a reservoir one hundred kilometers away. However, these reservoirs quickly dry up and Mexico City will have to go further and further away to look for water.

Likewise, as scientific knowledge continues to emerge, scientists have begun to come to the consensus that tackling deforestation is one of the key aspects of securing quality water supplies. Forests act as enormous reservoirs of water, which in turn attracts humidity and creates rain clouds. Forests follow hydraulic cycles by absorbing water when it rains and releasing it through evapotranspiration, when the water evaporates from the surface and when plants experience transpiration. However, with deforestation this hydraulic regulation is destroyed and the absorption capacity of the area is reduced.15 Therefore, although rain continues to fall just as much after the trees are cut, it floods the ground and streams down to nearby rivers since the

Ally |5 ground cannot absorb it without the aid of tree roots. As a result, while streaming into the rivers, it carries with it an enormous quantity of mud that becomes significantly destructive and also fills the river with mud. Consequently, the water becomes unsafe for drinking because of the accumulation of mud which reduces the amount of freshwater available for use. The diversion of water in various parts of the world is also a significant reason for the continuing depletion and impending destruction of the worlds fresh water supplies. Once thought to be a solution to the water crisis, water diversions takes water from where it exists in nature and moves it to big cities or industries far away. While in the past water had been diverted through canals, water today is carried through giant pipes that can take it very far away from its source. As a result, an increasing network of pipelines is being constructed to move water from one region to another, similar to the transportation of oil.16 However, when water is taken from a natural watershed, where it is needed as the lifeblood of the ecosystem, the result causes waterlevel draw-downs in the short-term and can result in full water depletion in the long-term.17 Consequently, this assumed solution to the worlds water crisis does not solve any problems but instead increases the disaster as can be seen in the following examples in recent history. The Aral Sea, for instance, offers a somber lesson into the permanent effects human ingenuity can have on fresh water supplies. As far as 60 years ago, water was massively diverted from the Aral Sea through a dredged canal and sent to the desert to grow cotton for export. At the time, the Aral Sea was the worlds fourth largest lake and its basin was shared by Afghanistan, Iran, and five other countries of the then Soviet Union. 18 In the pursuit of their ambitious agricultural irrigation program Soviet planners diverted so much water from rivers flowing into the Aral Sea that this huge inland body of water lost 90 percent of its volume and 75 percent of its surface area in mere decades. 19 In fact, the effects are so dramatic that Peter Annin

Ally |6 said in his book, The Great Lakes Water Wars, The Aral has receded so far that it takes more than five hours of driving on the old seabed in a four-wheel drive-vehicle to get from Muynak, on the old south shore to whats left of the shrunken Aral Sea- a distance of more than sixty miles.20 As a result, the diversion of the Aral Sea to irrigate the desert has caused the disappearance of one of the worlds greatest bodies of freshwater. Similarly, Lake Chad was the sixth largest lake in the world and the third largest in Africa. Once believed to be the source of the Nile, Lake Chad covered more than 20, 000 square kilometers and provided water to over 20 million people in four different countries, Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and Nigeria.21 The Chari River was considered its largest source of water, supplying as much as 90 percent of Lake Chads water supply. However, around 1970, there was increase in farming in the area as well as a severe drought in the region. Usually dependant on the monsoon rains to irrigate their fields, farmers began diverting water from the lake and especially the Chari and Longone river systems. As a result, by 2001 the lake covered just onefifth of that area or 1,350 square kilometers of the original area with scientists predicting its full disappearance in about 20 years.22 Consequently, the diversion of water from lakes like Lake Chad or the Aral Sea severely depleted the natural watersheds. Both examples and numerous others around the world are living examples of the dramatic effect of water diversion on bodies of freshwater. In desperate attempts to reverse the continuing depletion of the worlds fresh water supplies through projects such as damming, deforestation and diversion of water sources, wellmeaning governments have built the very foundations of the system that is now turning on the people it was meant to serve. Dams, built to supply energy and irrigation are instead very rapidly depleting the worlds limited freshwater supplies. Deforestation is eroding the soil and polluting

Ally |7 the little water sources left unpolluted. Likewise, the diversion of water sources has created ecological disasters across the globe, like the Aral Sea and Lake Chad and has equally devastated entire regions. Once a lake is drained and a watershed is depleted, there is no more water and almost no way in which it can be replenished. As a result, nations must to work together in order to assess how much water in the world is still usable. In addition, they need to introduce measures in order to stop the depletion of the worlds fresh water supplies and to ensure that there are adequate water resources for future generations. Measures such as the decommissioning of dams needs to become a necessary initiative, forests need to be protected and diversion projects halted indefinitely. It is essential that preventative measures are taken before it is too late and before there is no utilizable fresh water left on the Earth. It is essential to remember that water is the means by which life is given to everything. As a result the time has come for a drastic change in the global treatment of water. Just as people are moved by water, the world must move quickly in order to save it.

Ron Fridell. Protecting Earth's Water Supply. Minneapolis, MN: Lerner Publications, 2009. p6.

Julian Caldecott. Water: The Causes, Costs and Future of a Global Crisis. London: Virgin, 2008. p56.
3

"Groundwater." Columbia Water Center. Columbia University. Web. 29 Apr. 2011.

Tony Clarke and Maude Barlow. Blue Gold: the Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water. New York: New, 2002. p48. Maude Barlow. Blue Covenant: the Global Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water. New York: New, 2008. p20
5

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Clarke, 49-50

Marq De Villiers. Water: the Fate of Our Most Precious Resource. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2003. p139. Blue Gold: World Water Wars. Dir. Sam Bozzo. Prod. Mark Achbar and Si Litvinoff. Purple Turtle Films, 2008. DVD. "Deforestation Facts, Deforestation Information, Effects of Deforestation - National Geographic." National Geographic. National Geographic Society. Web. 27 Apr. 2011. FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). 2001. The State of World Marine Fisheries and Aquaculture. Rome. FAO, Fisheries Department.
11 10 9 8

Clarke, 38.

"Deforestation And Water Quality Are Inextricably Linked." TotallyDrinkable.com. Web. 28 Apr. 2011.
13

12

Vandana Shiva. Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution and Profit. Cambridge, MA: South End, Blue Gold: World Water Wars

2002. p2.
14

"What Are the Consequences of Deforestation on the Natural Water Patterns?" Environment for Beginners. Web. 29 Apr. 2011.
16

15

Barlow, 23 Ibid Barlow, 26

17

18

Robert Jerome Glennon. Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis and What to Do about It. Washington, DC: Island, 2009. p.98.
20

19

Peter Annin. The Great Lakes Water Wars. Washington: Island, 2006. p15. Barlow, 26

21

Hillary, Mayell. "Shrinking African Lake Offers Lesson on Finite Resources." Daily Nature and Science News and Headlines. National Geographic News, 26 Apr. 2001. Web. 28 Apr. 2011.

22

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Works Cited Annin, Peter. The Great Lakes Water Wars. Washington: Island, 2006. Print. Barlow, Maude. Blue Covenant: the Global Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water. New York: New, 2008. Print. Barlow, Maude. Blue Gold: the Global Water Crisis and the Commodification of the World's Water Supply. San Francisco: International Forum on Globalization, 2001. Print. Blue Gold: World Water Wars. Dir. Sam Bozzo. Prod. Mark Achbar and Si Litvinoff. Purple Turtle Films, 2008. DVD. Butler, Rhett A. "Impact of Deforestation - Local and National Effects." Rainforests. Mongabay.com. Web. 27 Apr. 2011. Caldecott, Julian. Water: The Causes, Costs and Future of a Global Crisis. London: Virgin, 2008. Print. Clarke, Tony and Maude Barlow. Blue Gold: the Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water. New York: New, 2002. Print. Deforestation And Water Quality Are Inextricably Linked." TotallyDrinkable.com. Web. 28 Apr. 2011. Deforestation Facts, Deforestation Information, Effects of Deforestation - National Geographic." National Geographic. National Geographic Society. Web. 27 Apr. 2011. FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). 2001. The State of World Marine Fisheries and Aquaculture. Rome. FAO, Fisheries Department. Fridell, Ron. Protecting Earth's Water Supply. Minneapolis, MN: Lerner Publications, 2009. Print. Glennon, Robert Jerome. Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis and What to Do about It. Washington, DC: Island, 2009. Print. Groundwater." Columbia Water Center. Columbia University. Web. 29 Apr. 2011. Mayell, Hillary. "Shrinking African Lake Offers Lesson on Finite Resources." Daily Nature and Science News and Headlines. National Geographic News, 26 Apr. 2001. Web. 28 Apr. 2011. Mayell, Hilary. "Shrinking African Lake Offers Lesson on Finite Resources." Daily Nature and

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Science News and Headlines. National Geographic News, 26 Apr. 2001. Web. 28 Apr. 2011. Shiva, Vandana. Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution and Profit. Cambridge, MA: South End, 2002. Print. Suryana, A'an. "Deforestation Causing Water Crisis in Java | The Jakarta Post." The Jakarta Post. PT Bina Media Tenggara, 27 May 2002. Web. 27 Apr. 2011. Villiers, Marq De. Water: the Fate of Our Most Precious Resource. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2003. Print What Are the Consequences of Deforestation on the Natural Water Patterns?" Environment for Beginners. Web. 29 Apr. 2011.