Boost groundwater
Groundwater is nectar for every living organism on this earth. It is stored beneath the land surface and moves slowly through geologic formations of soil, sand, gravel and rocks called aquifers.
- When groundwater (with added minerals by nature) reaches an aquifer, it moves slowly at rates of 7 to 60 centimeters per day in an aquifer. That is why water could remain in an aquifer for thousands of years.
- Groundwater is naturally recharged by rainwater, snow-melt and through water veins of the lakes and rivers.
The oceans contain about 97 percent of the Earth's water, but that is not drinkable. About 2 percent is frozen at the poles or in glaciers. Of the remaining 1 percent, almost all of it (about 96 percent) is groundwater, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The rest of our freshwater is found at the surface in streams, lakes, rivers and wetlands.
Groundwater is directly related to human existence and to the sustainable development of a society. Groundwater provides drinking water to at least 50% of the global population and accounts for 43% of all of the water used for irrigation (FAO, 2010). Worldwide, 2.5 billion people depend solely on groundwater resources to satisfy their basic daily water needs (UNESCO, 2012).
Groundwater exploitation increases the discharge of groundwater, changing the natural flow field, and has become the most important discharge route for groundwater. Construction of reservoirs in the upstream areas has reduced groundwater recharge by surface water in the plain. Declining groundwater levels pose many environmental and geological problems.
And now we are running out of groundwater.
Factors slowing down the recharge of groundwater and making it poisonous:
- Deforestation is directly proportional to decreasing the groundwater.
- Construction of reservoirs in the upstream areas has reduced groundwater recharge by surface water in the plain.
- Unplanned infrastructure - which covers the land more than enough.
- Plastic waste makes the layer which prevents water from going underground.
- Untreated sewer water and waste.
- Indiscriminate excavation of mines and minerals that destroys the veins of water.
- Linking rivers to each other will stop their natural flow and that will damage the land's fertility.
- Toxic activities(using chemical fertilizers and pesticides in agriculture, suppressing toxins in the soil, etc.) of humans on land.
Don't think that we have a big sea to meet the water requirement. During the process of obtaining pure water from the seawater, a chemical called brine is produced due to salts. And by re-immersing it in the seawater, many organisms die of intolerable salts.