Before you head out, check out the “Plan Your Visit” section on the park’s website or contact the park to find out if there are potable drinking water sources in the park and along your adventure route. “Potable water” is clean water that’s safe to drink, brush your teeth with, wash your hands with, and use for preparing food. The challenge we now face as we head into the future is how to effectively conserve, manage, and distribute the water we have.Viisotr filtering water at Cosley Lake in Glacier National ParkĪre you going to explore the great outdoors? It is very important that you plan for your water needs as potable water may not always be available, especially in backcountry and wilderness areas. By 2025, an estimated 1.8 billion people will live in areas plagued by water scarcity, with two-thirds of the world's population living in water-stressed regions as a result of use, growth, and climate change. (The average hamburger takes 2,400 liters, or 630 gallons, of water to produce, and many water-intensive crops, such as cotton, are grown in arid regions.)Īccording to the United Nations, water use has grown at more than twice the rate of population increase in the last century. Unfortunately, humans have proved to be inefficient water users. Each presentation is filmed in front of a live audience at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C. The National Geographic Live! series brings thought-provoking presentations by today’s leading explorers, scientists, photographers, and performing artists right to your YouTube feed. National Geographic Fellow Sandra Postel views the world through a water lens, advocating for all to make simple and easy changes to their everyday lives that will help "Change the Course" of the Earth's precious supply of freshwater. Not only is the human body 60 percent water, the resource is also essential for producing food, clothing, and computers, moving our waste stream, and keeping us and the environment healthy. Wherever they are, people need water to survive. In much of the developing world, clean water is either hard to come by or a commodity that requires laborious work or significant currency to obtain. In essence, only 0.007 percent of the planet's water is available to fuel and feed its 6.8 billion people.ĭue to geography, climate, engineering, regulation, and competition for resources, some regions seem relatively flush with freshwater, while others face drought and debilitating pollution. Even then, just 1 percent of our freshwater is easily accessible, with much of it trapped in glaciers and snowfields. While nearly 70 percent of the world is covered by water, only 2.5 percent of it is fresh. It is the result of myriad environmental, political, economic, and social forces.įreshwater makes up a very small fraction of all water on the planet. Water scarcity is an abstract concept to many and a stark reality for others. This means that every year competition for a clean, copious supply of water for drinking, cooking, bathing, and sustaining life intensifies. While the amount of freshwater on the planet has remained fairly constant over time-continually recycled through the atmosphere and back into our cups-the population has exploded. The water you drink today has likely been around in one form or another since dinosaurs roamed the Earth, hundreds of millions of years ago.
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