Friday, July 25, 2014
Groundwater reservoirs are being depleted too quickly
Scientists have recently discovered that groundwater reservoirs are being depleted more and more rapidly. It has been found that 90 percent of water is being used for farming and irrigation purposes, and only the remaining 10 percent is used for drinking water. This action has caused various issues for ecosystems as well as a growing lack of sufficient groundwater resources. Researcher Petra Döll explains that some farmers have begun to use techniques to help conserve groundwater resources, but even so, the amount of reservoirs that are being depleted continues to increase. It has been found that current groundwater depletion is twice as high as it was from the last forty years of the twentieth century, and that the highest amount of consumption currently occurs in India, America, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and China. One possible solution to this issue could be for people to work together to create more awareness for water conservation throughout the world. However, this may be difficult because some people may not agree that there is a need to reduce water consumption, especially if the primary use for water for some people is for sustenance. Personally, I believe that water conservation is very important, because everything on the Earth depends on it. If we do not conserve our groundwater reservoirs, we will use it up before it can be replenished naturally.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140717094824.htm
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Great post, Corey. I agree with you in regards to increasing awareness for groundwater conservation. It's something we don't always think about; we turn on the sink, the shower, the garden hose, the fridge water system, its as mindless as flipping on a light switch. If you think about eliminating any of the sources I just listed, an individuals life would change drastically. Also, just out of curiosity, did the researchers come up with a certain time frame as to when the groundwater could be completely depleted if consumption is unchanged? That might be an interesting thing to point out in effort to raise awareness.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I could find, the researchers did not have a time frame estimating when these groundwater resources would be depleted if we continue to use them at this rate. They did, however, explain that global groundwater depletion has reached approximately 113,000 million cubic meters per year (which is the most reliable figure we have). Even though this number is lower than previous estimates, it is still too large. I agree with you that it would be interesting to see an estimated time frame as to when our nonrenewable groundwater resources would be depleted, because I think it would be very helpful in raising awareness.
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