Water Facts
Water Facts to keep in mind:
- 1 trillion litres of untreated sewage is dumped into Canadian waters every year by our 20 largest cities. (Sierra Legal Defense Fund)
- 160 waterborne disease outbreaks were reported in Canada every decade – estimates are only one-tenth of the total number of disease outbreaks are actually reported. (Health Canada).
- In British Columbia, communities under ‘boil water advisories’ grew from 19 in 1986 to more than 300 in 2001.
- What does the municipality or government do when there is a boil water alert?
- In Ontario, 645 municipal water plants failed to meet health standards in December 2000.
- In Quebec, 542 water pollution advisories were issued in the year 2000.
- In Newfoundland and Labrador, 302 ‘boil water advisories’ were issued in 2002, affecting 65,000 people. (sadly,
- One-quarter of all bottled water is transported by train, boat, and plane – burning a massive amount of fossil fuels.
- Worldwide, 2.7 million tons of plastic are used annually to bottle water, with more than 85% of bottles becoming garbage, litter and filling up landfill sites.
- Globally, $100 billion is spent each year on bottled water. The U.N. Millennium Development Plan to halve the number of people lacking access to safe drinking water by the year 2015 would cost $15 billion per year.
- At the current rate of global warming melting Asian glaciers, within 50 years, 40% of the world’s population will lose their primary source of freshwater.
- Up to 60% of the human body is water; the brain is composed of 70% water, blood is 82% water, and the lungs are nearly 90% water.
- Canadian water facts state: 64% of freshwater is withdrawn for thermal power generation, 14% for manufacturing, 12% for municipal use, 9% for agriculture, and 1% for mining.
- It takes 39,090 gallons of water to manufacture a new car, including new tires.
- It takes 62,600 gallons of water to produce one tonne of steel.
- It takes 1,851 gallons of water to refine one barrel of crude oil
- It takes 14 gallons of water to grow a medium-size orange (and bring it to market)
- It takes 48.3 gallons of water to produce one eight-ounce glass of milk (to feed the cattle, process it and bring it to market)
- It takes about 45% more water to make a slice of white bread than a slice of brown bread (added cost of extra processing to the flour to make white bread).
- 300 litres of water is required to produce 1 kg. of paper
- 10 litres of water is required to manufacture one litre of gasoline
- 60% of Canada’s fresh water drains north, while 85% of the population lives along the southern border with the United States
- The Great Lakes are the largest system of fresh, surface water on earth, containing roughly 18% of the world supply
- Daily activities water usage: washing hands 8 litres, brushing teeth 10 litres, toilet flush 15 – 19 litres, washing dishes by hand 35 litres, dishwashers 40 litres, tub bath 60 litres, 5-min. shower 100 litres, washing machine 225 litres
- Toilets (while consuming nearly one-quarter of our municipal water supply) use over 40% more water than needed.
- Each year 3 to 4 million people die of waterborne diseases, including 2 million children, who die of diarrhea.
- North Americans use an average of 350 litres of water a day. A person living in sub-Saharan Africa gets by on 10 to 20 litres a day.
- Half of the world’s population still suffers from water services inferior to those available to the ancient Greeks and Romans.
As the quality of our water continues to decline, the need to filter our water has never been greater to protect ourselves and our families from
Though more than 60,000 chemicals are used in the United States currently, only 91 contaminants are currently being regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act. No chemicals have been added to that list since 2000.
More fun facts:
There are two kinds of water: salt water and fresh water. Salt water contains—you guessed it—large quantities of salt, while fresh water has a dissolved salt concentration of less than 1%. Only fresh water can be used as drinking water.
North Americans use five times the amount of water that Europeans use.
A small drip from a faucet can waste as much as 75 litres of water a day.
Frozen water is 9% lighter than water, which explains why ice floats.
Water is the only substance on earth that is found naturally in three forms: liquid, solid and gas.
A trillion tons of water is evaporated every day by the sun!
If you ever catch a fever, be sure to drink lots of water—it regulates your body temperature.
In Canada, there is more water underground than on the surface.
Most of the water found on the earth’s surface is permanently frozen or salty.
Less than 1% of the water supply on earth can be used as drinking water.
More than 90% of the world’s supply of fresh water is located in Antarctica.
The earth is a closed system that rarely loses or gains extra matter. Essentially, this means that the same water that existed on earth millions of years ago is still present today.
Pure water has no smell and no taste. It also has a pH level of around 7. (unless filtered by RO or distilled)
Canada is home to 25% of the world’s wetlands. In fact, it’s the largest wetland area in the world.
Our bodies are 60-70% water; our brains are 75% water; our lungs are nearly 90% water; and our blood is about 82% water.
Less than 1% of the water supply on earth can be used as drinking water.
About 6,800 gallons (25,700 liters) of water is required to grow a day’s food for a family of four.water-grow-food-calculator.png
An acre of corn will give off 4,000 gallons (15,000 liters) of water per day in evaporation.
A person can live about a month without food, but only about a week without water. If a human does not absorb enough water dehydration is the result.
Most of the earth’s surface water is permanently frozen or salty.
2.5% of the earth’s fresh water is unavailable: locked up in glaciers, polar ice caps, atmosphere, and soil; highly polluted; or lies too far under the earth’s surface to be extracted at an affordable cost.
An estimated 790 million people (11% of the world’s population) live without access to an improved water supply.
A small drip from a faucet can waste as much as 34 gallons or 128 liters of water a day. drip-calculator provided by water.usgs.gov
On average, women in developing countries walk 3.7 miles (6 kilometers) a day to collect water. In Africa alone, women spend 40 billion hours a year walking for water.
Every day, six billion gallons of treated water is lost due to leaking pipes in the U.S.
There are still an estimated 240,000 water main breaks per year in the United States, wasting over two trillion gallons of treated drinking water.
Drinking water is delivered via one million miles of pipes across the United States.
In the U.S., an estimated $1.38 trillion in investment is needed to keep up with demand of water in the next 25 years.us-water-investment-needs.png
Though more than 60,000 chemicals are used in the United States currently, only 91 contaminants are currently being regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act. No chemicals have been added to that list since 2000.
Human bones are 31% water.
Around 700 million people in 43 countries suffer today from water scarcity. By 2025, 1.8 billion people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity, and two-thirds of the world’s population could be living under water stressed conditions.
Bottled water can be up to 2000 times more expensive than tap water and it may not be as safe.
A point-of-use drinking water filtration system, such as Reverse Osmosis, costs only pennies per gallon of purified water, allows people to refill water bottles, and keeps more water bottles out of landfills.
“Legally Safe” and “Totally Safe” mean two completely different things to the EPA. The CWA (Clean Water Act) regulates 9 contaminants. If tap water contains less than the maximum acceptable levels of those contaminants you water is legally safe. Yet the EPA is investigating 10,000 others that are not regulated, known to be in tap water, with safety unknown. Hence, the reason you should ‘treat’ “Legally Safe” water.
More than half of the water used in a home is used in the bathroom.
Ultraviolet light can destroy 99.99% of harmful microorganisms (bacteria, viruses, cysts) in water to make water safer to drink.
Less than 1% of the water treated by public water suppliers is used for drinking and cooking. The municipality does what it can to make the water safer to drink, but does not have the budget to send us safe chemical free water.
Public supply represents about 14 percent of total freshwater withdrawals.
90% of all North Americans receive their drinking water from a public water supply.
Thirst ensures that creatures maintain a balance of hydration and nutrients, such as sodium, that are vital to the healthy functioning of cells.
Each day, enough rain falls on the United States to cover the entire state of Vermont with 2 feet of water
How much water should you drink a day? Health authorities commonly recommend eight 8-ounce glasses, which equals about 2 liters, or half a gallon. This is called the 8×8 rule and is very easy to remember.
We lose over 2 quarts (64 oz) of water every day through the normal vapor exchange of our skin, otherwise known as perspiration.
It is a little known fact, but insufficient water consumption is actually a risk factor for various types of cancer. Hydration is critical to blood circulation to allow immune system cells to reach damaged tissues in greater numbers.
In 1998 the National Resources Defense Council completed a 4-year test of 103 bottles water, and found that 1/3 of them contained bacteria and other chemicals at levels exceeding industry standards.
Pure water (solely hydrogen and oxygen atoms) has a neutral pH of 7, which is neither acidic nor basic.
A single gallon of gasoline can contaminate 750,000 gallons of water.
Ground water contamination is nearly always the result of human activity.
A whole-house ultraviolet water disinfection system can ensure household water is safe from harmful bacteria and harmful water-borne viruses.
There are 12,000 different toxic chemical compounds in industrial use today, and more than 500 new chemicals are developed each year.
Water dissolves more substances than any other liquid. Wherever it travels, water carries chemicals, minerals, and nutrients with it.
Freshwater animals are vanishing faster than those on land or at sea.
Water continually evaporates, condenses, and precipitates, and on a global basis, evaporation approximately equals precipitation.
According to the EPA, lead exposure is linked to physical development delays and behavioral problems. You can remove 98% of lead in water with a reverse osmosis drinking water system.
The weight a person loses directly after intense physical activity is weight from water, not fat.
At birth, water accounts for approximately 80 percent of an infant’s body weight.
To produce one chicken, we need 330 gallons of water.
Aquifers in industrialized areas are at significant risk of being contaminated by chemicals and petroleum products.
There are 800,000 miles of public sewage pipes in the U.S.
To manufacture new cars, between 13,737 to 21,926 gallons of water are used per car.
According to the EPA, a full bathtub requires about 70 gallons of water, while taking a five-minute shower uses 10 to 25 gallons.
The aging infrastructure in North America causes a water main break every two minutes, causing other contaminants to enter your drinking water. Many of which often go unnoticed.