Important Facts about Water
Can I drink water if it looks clean?
The water that comes out of your tap is OK to drink; however, you should not drink water just because it looks clean to you. There are many harmful chemicals in certain types of water that do not make the water look dirty but could make you very sick.
Which countries do not have clean drinking water?
The tap water in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Canada is safe to drink. In other countries around the world, people either use bottled water or a water purifying machine that purifies the tap water to make it safe to drink (this water comes out of a separate faucet)
Can I drink water from the garden hose?
The water coming from the garden hose is the same water that comes into your kitchen faucet; however, you should not drink it. Garden hoses are made using special chemicals, and these chemicals get into the water and make it unsafe to drink.
Why is our tap water clean?
Our tap water is clean because water treatment plants add special chemicals to it to make the water safe to drink.
Why can’t we use salt water?
There is a lot of salt water in the world; in fact, oceans cover a larger area of the world than land does. Unfortunately, the large amount of salt in ocean water makes it unsuitable for drinking. It not only tastes bad but would also make you very sick. On top of that, salt is bad for plants and soil. Watering plants with salt water would make them die and would also ruin the soil, making it impossible to grow other plants in the same area.
Some conservationists are trying to make salt water safe to drink. This can be done by a process called desalination (this means taking the salt out of the sea water so we can use it for drinking, cooking and other things). However, it is very difficult and expensive to desalinate water, so for right now the ocean water cannot help us very much.
Why are we in danger of running out of water?
Everyone needs water and the fact that the world population is growing means that there are more people than ever who need clean drinking water. Additionally, farmers need to grow more food to feed more people, which means they need more water to do so. Ranchers (people who raise cows, pigs, chickens and other animals that we eat) also need more water to feed their animals so that we can all have meat to eat.
Sadly, we have not always taken care of the water we have and so have lost a lot of it. When water is lost, it is gone forever. Why? Here is a simple explanation of how the water cycle works.
The water in the lakes, rivers and ocean evaporates (is dried up by the sun). This water then turns into clouds.
When it rains, the water comes back to us. It waters the soil and fills the lakes and rivers.
Then the sun comes out and the water dries up again. The process continues on and on and on.