It’s also why water is so easily polluted. It’s the reason we have Kool-Aid and brilliant blue waterfalls.
Known as a “universal solvent,” water is able to dissolve more substances than any other liquid on earth. Water is uniquely vulnerable to pollution. Water pollution occurs when harmful substances-often chemicals or microorganisms-contaminate a stream, river, lake, ocean, aquifer, or other body of water, degrading water quality and rendering it toxic to humans or the environment. To better understand the problem and what we can do about it, here’s an overview of what water pollution is, what causes it, and how we can protect ourselves. Still, we’re not hopeless against the threat to clean water. But while most Americans have access to safe drinking water, potentially harmful contaminants-from arsenic to copper to lead-have been found in the tap water of every single state in the nation. Sip a glass of cool, clear water as you read this, and you may think water pollution is a problem. Without action, the challenges will only increase by 2050, when global demand for freshwater is expected to be one-third greater than it is now. Meanwhile, our drinkable water sources are finite: Less than 1 percent of the earth’s freshwater is actually accessible to us.
Unsafe water kills more people each year than war and all other forms of violence combined. This widespread problem of water pollution is jeopardizing our health. Some 80 percent of the world’s wastewater is dumped-largely untreated-back into the environment, polluting rivers, lakes, and oceans. Auden once noted, “Thousands have lived without love, not one without water.” Yet while we all know water is crucial for life, we trash it anyway.
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