Why does people worry about wasting water? Isn't water going to last forever anyway?

Question

I take a 30 minute shower twice a day. I leave the water run while shaving, brushing teeth, and washing dishes. Also, I flush my cigerette butts down the toilet and there is no water shortage where I am at. I think people are just worried about nothing.

Answer 1

Many places don't have enough water. Even where there is plenty of water, it costs a lot to clean all that water and prepare it for use. You shouldn't waste it.

Answer 2

There are 2 kinds of water - water that's safe to drink, and water that isn't. It used to be that a lot of 'fresh' water (water from rivers, springs and other non-oceanic sources) was fine to drink without treatment, but increasingly it's contaminated by things that make it unsafe to drink without cleaning first - things like toxic chemicals or harmful microorganisms (parasites or bacteria). It's not cheap to clean water enough to be able to drink it safely, but it's also expensive to have people drinking water that makes them sick or kills them (not to mention being unpleasant for the people involved - imagine getting very sick every time you drank water or brushed your teeth). Every time you use water, it goes to a sewage treatment plant (we hope) where it is treated to remove the harmful stuff before being released into the nearest river or whatever. Then, new water is taken in and treated before it's pumped to your home to be used for drinking, washing or whatever. It doesn't matter what you use the water for, it's still treated as if it comes from your toilet, and it doesn't matter what you're going to use the water for, it's still treated as if you're going to drink it. That's a lot of money to just throw away, even if you don't feel it directly right now.

Answer 3

Actually, water is in plenty on earth, but only 3-4% is drinkable. Water will not go away anywhere, it keeps recycling but will not be in a form for daily use. Will you be able to brush your teeth with sewage water? that is why we are trying to save water so that it can be used at its best.

Answer 4

Your behaviour is most despicable; even where you have resources in plentiful supply, you must learn to use them sparingly. Over-consumption of resources is a "crime" against the environment, so please change your water-gussling ways. Raw water may occupy over 75% of the earth's crust, but less than 5% may be fit for direct human use. Water is life itself, preserve it!

Answer 5

water shortage


expanding populations use more and more Potable water(world population has doubled in the last 50 years)
expanding agriculture that needs to keep up with the expanding popultaions uses the most ,,even more than the cities about 75% of all water reserves.

potable water is becoming more precious by the day
we will end up killing each other over Potable water
some people already are

WE MUST START
controlling populations ,
promote sweet water production,(Masive reforrestation)
and take care of what we got (Nature conservation)
,plus strong policing on usage,as well as economic usage of water in agriculture

Waterharvesting .WILL also help solve the problems


huge storages of water are getting lost due to global warming(melting Ice) as well as over and irresposible usage

93% of all f the planets water is salt
of the 7 remaning % of sweet water 75% was locked in glaziers,mountain snows and the poles,
a lot of this is now melted and has joined the salt waters in the seas gone forever as drinking water.

we on the land have about o,o8 % to play with for agriculture and drinking .

and many rivers and lakes are now contaminated ,

Deep under ground Carbon aquifiers are pumped dry ,by irresponsible egoistic and greedy farmers

.these Carbon Aquifiers do not refill them selves causing sink holes often a few miles deep.


(http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...
.
better to pump surface underground water supplies coupled to WATERHARVESTING

the natural way of nature is to evaporate moisture for clouds and this gets blown to places with less water any way ,what obstruct the clouds from getting to deserts ,tend to be mountains that are in the way,
but generally speaking ,the normal weather patterns spread rain evenly over the planet to balance out the temperatures and humidity.

As far as catching rain is concerned ,we do this all the time ,and have done so already since Babylonian times,and is a part of the more advanced Agriculture,that existed with the Egyptians,Central ,and south American indigenous peoples,and many others ,today we call this water harvesting.

In Permaculture the rule is to harvest water to the point of Zero runoff.
this means that all of the rain that falls on an area is absorbed by the terrain and not a drop leaves it.

by building dams,ponds or swales, with interconecting ditches,
if there are enough of these ;the places ,where before the rain water ran over the ground into the rivers and on to the sea ,(in a matter of hours or days),It now runs into absorbant dams or swales and saturates the ground and eventually reaches subteranean water deposits ,taking many months to do so.
Or it fills up ponds that can be used for Aquaculture.
And so a convex situation that repels water is transformed in a concave ,absorbant one and turning the area in to a sponge.

in Spain and Portugal ,which still display many examples of the conquering Moorish influence,One can find many remnants of Waterharvesting,such as aquaducts and tanks underneath the patios ,which collect the rain water from the roofs ,to be used in dryer times.

in Arabia ,on a large scale ,land has been shaped to catch and lead,rain water into sandy areas or to agricultural lands.sand is almost as good as dams because it absorbs water and holds it.

to find out more about Water harvesting I recomend:
the designers manual by Bil Mollison,which cost about 40 dollars.
and is the best all round book you can get.(tagiari publishing, [e-mail])

Permaculture means permanent agriculture
a concept put forward by Bill Mollisson in the 60`s
which is a complete hand book for environmental design.
for those who seek an ambiotic relationship with our planet
With practical solutions for energy systems ,infratructure ,housing,
animal shelter ,water systems and sustainable agricultural practises.
With the world and it`s history as it`s source
From the chinampas of Mexico to the teraced gardens of the Andes.
From the dessert whadis to the steppes of Russia.
Covering all climatic conditions temporal, dessert, humid and dry tropics.
with chapters on soil ,Water harvesting and land design,
Earth working ,Spirals in nature,Trees and water ,utilising energy flows,
Strategy for an alternative nation Source(s) some other writers that are on the internet are
david Holmgren
Larry Santoyo
Kirk Hanson

Masanobu Fukuaka has written ,
One-Straw Revolution
The Road Back to Nature
The Natural Way of Farming
http://www.context.org/iclib/ic14/fukuok...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/masanobu_fu...

Simon Henderson
and Bill Molisson.

a representitive of the concept in USA is
Dan Hemenway at [e-mail]
[e-mail]
http://barkingfrogspc.tripod.com/frames....
http://csf.colorado.edu/perma/ypc_catalo...

read Plan B by Lester E Brown.who is the director and founder of the global institute of Environment in the United states .he has compiled a report based on all the satalite information available from NASA,and all the information that has
come from Universities and American embassies WORLD WIDE ,
his little book--a planet under stress , Plan B has been trans lated into 50 languages and won the best book award in 2003.


I am a permaculture consultant for the department of Ecology for the regional government of Guerrero in Mexico

i got a yahoo 360 which has some stuff in English as well as this spaces
http://spaces.msn.com/byderule

Answer 6

yes the water will be here forever~~barring our sun going supernova or some such~~but if we dont conserve we will have nothing but sewage and filth to drink.

Answer 7

Water will last forever, potable water won't.

Answer 8

You are funny, eat,drink and be merry, for tomorrow we shall die. I think Shakespeare said that.
He is dead.