What is the approximate ratio of fresh to salt water on earth?

Question

I would guess that the polar ice caps are a large reservoir of fresh water, but much smaller than the salt water in the oceans

Answer 1

INDEED POLAR ICE CAPS ARE GREAT RESERVOIRS OF FRESH WATERS, BUT THAT WATER IS NOT PERFECTLY PURE. IT IS ABOUT 97.57987572489549683563547657685757424524524582435577595036735603969785275249711754548754785478524785478547854785647598359900000000000000000000000000000000000524565365I249535902449256529524682975741634913759724248713462578247824139204R7824571431943314713743843874343141367530355240424574579459724792454579457949 % PURE .
COMING TO YOUR QUESTION, THE REQUIRED RATIO IS APPROXIMATELY 4 : 247, I THINK.

Answer 2

The amount of fresh water in ice caps and glaciers adds up to considerably more than a drop in the bucket when compared with the salty ocean, but it is still only a glass of water in the bathtub, according to estimates by Dr. David A. Ross, an oceanographer and a scientist emeritus at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.

In his textbook "Introduction to Oceanography," Dr. Ross estimated that the ocean had 97.2 percent of the earth's total water and put the freshwater ice caps and glaciers at 2.15 percent.

Saline lakes and inland seas would add a trace of salt water, or 0.008 percent of the global total.

Relatively small amounts of fresh water are also found in groundwater (0.625 percent of total water), freshwater lakes (0.009 percent), the atmosphere (0.001 percent) and rivers and streams (0.0001 percent.)

Dr. Joris Gieskes, a geochemist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, gave a slightly different approximation of the ocean's share of the earth's water, about 97 percent, and put the ice caps at 2.1 percent of the total. While rivers carry salt from land to ocean, Dr. Gieskes said, the ocean does not increase in salinity because about the same amount of salt is removed to underlying sediments..

Answer 3

Before you choose the best answer, today the mind boggling concern is what will happen to fresh water availability for human and industrial use, after 2 generations, when looking at the level of uncared for industrial pollution , and river and stream water pollution due to mixing up of human waste, drainage water and mismanagement of water resources.

To my knowledge polar ice caps, once they start melting beyond natural levels, it will result into global warming, posing yet another problem.
To confine to the question asked, the approximate ratio will
be anywhere around 1:3.

Answer 4

Various estimates are available for different geological periods of Earth's existance and even today, but suffice it to say that almost all the water on Earth is in the oceans as salt water. One of the other responders listed .001% as the atmospheric load of fresh water relative to total water, but I have seen much higher estimates of this. I will try to find a website address and amend this when I have time. Other than that one figure those estimates are current and aprroximately correct.
A found an authoritative website and listed it below.

Answer 5

U cant predict this ratio even as approximation bcoz may be some where large amount of salt or fresh water present

Answer 6

it is roughly 1:3

Answer 7

ratio is 0.3:100 approx