Facts about water

1. FACTS ABOUT WATER
1. Roughly 70 percent of an adult’s body is made up of water.
2. At birth, water accounts for approximately 80 percent of an infant’s body weight.
3. A healthy person can drink about three gallons (48 cups) of water per day.
4. Drinking too much water too quickly can lead to water intoxication. Water
intoxication occurs when water dilutes the sodium level in the bloodstream and
causes an imbalance of water in the brain.
5. Water intoxication is most likely to occur during periods of intense athletic
performance.
6. While the daily recommended amount of water is eight cups per day, not all of
this water must be consumed in the liquid form. Nearly every food or drink item
provides some water to the body.
7. Soft drinks, coffee, and tea, while made up almost entirely of water, also contain
caffeine. Caffeine can act as a mild diuretic, preventing water from traveling to
necessary locations in the body.
8. Pure water (solely hydrogen and oxygen atoms) has a neutral pH of 7, which is
neither acidic nor basic.
9. Water dissolves more substances than any other liquid. Wherever it travels,
water carries chemicals, minerals, and nutrients with it.
10.Somewhere between 70 and 75 percent of the earth’s surface is covered with
water.
11.Much more fresh water is stored under the ground in aquifers than on the
earth’s surface.
12.The earth is a closed system, similar to a terrarium, meaning that it rarely loses
or gains extra matter. The same water that existed on the earth millions of years
ago is still present today.
13.The total amount of water on the earth is about 326 million cubic miles of water.
14.Of all the water on the earth, humans can used only about three tenths of a
percent of this water. Such usable water is found in groundwater aquifers,
rivers, and freshwater lakes.
15.The United States uses about 346,000 million gallons of fresh water every day.
16.The United States uses nearly 80 percent of its water for irrigation and
thermoelectric power.
17.The average person in the United States uses anywhere from 80-100 gallons
of water per day. Flushing the toilet actually takes up the largest amount of this
water.
18.Approximately 85 percent of U.S. residents receive their water from public water
facilities. The remaining 15 percent supply their own water from private wells or
other sources.
19.By the time a person feels thirsty, his or her body has lost over 1 percent of its
total water amount.
20.The weight a person loses directly after intense physical activity is weight from
water, not fat.

2. 10 Reasons to Use a Water Filter
1. In order to capitalize on the health benefits of water, it is
essential to draw from a clean source of water.
2. Drinking impure, contaminated water is the leading cause of epidemic disease in developing
countries.
3. There are more than 2100 known drinking water contaminants that may be present in tap water,
including several known poisons.
4. Bottled water does not offer a viable alternative to tap water.
5. Municipal water treatment facilities cannot always control for the outbreak of dangerous
bacterial contaminants in tap water.
6. The only way to ensure pure, contaminant-free drinking water is through the use of a point-of-
use filtration system.
7. Several types of cancer can be attributed to the presence of toxic materials in drinking water.
8. Clean, healthy drinking water is essential to a child’s proper mental and physical development.
9. According to the EPA, lead in drinking water contributes to 480,000 cases of learning disorders
in children each year in the United States alone.
10. It is especially important for pregnant women to drink pure water as lead in drinking water can
cause severe birth defects.
100 FACTS ABOUT WATER
 Water is made up of two elements, hydrogen and oxygen. Its chemical formula is H2O.
 Each molecule of water is made up of two hydrogen atoms bonded to a single oxygen atom.
 The existence of water is essential for life on Earth.
 Water has three different states, liquid, solid and gas.
 The word water usually refers to water in its liquid state. The solid state of water is known as
ice while the gas state of water is known as steam or water vapor.
 Water covers around 70% of the Earth’s surface.
 The three largest oceans on Earth are the Pacific Ocean (largest), the Atlantic Ocean (second
largest) and the Indian Ocean (third largest). More ocean facts.
 Found in the Pacific Ocean, the Mariana Trench is the deepest known point in the world’s
oceans.
 Ocean tides are caused by the rotation of the Earth and the gravitational pull of the Moon and
Sun acting on ocean water.
 Water from a sea or ocean is known as seawater. On average, every kilogram (2.2lb) of
seawater contains around 35 grams (1.2 oz) of dissolved salt.
 The freezing point of water lowers as the amount of salt dissolved in at increases. With average
levels of salt, seawater freezes at -2 °C (28.4 °F).
 The longest river in the world is the Nile River, it reaches 6650 kilometers in length (4132 miles).
 The second longest river in the world is the Amazon River, it reaches 6400 kilometres (4000
miles) in length.
 The longest river in the USA is the Missouri River. At around 2,340 miles (3,770 km) in length
it is slightly longer than the Mississippi River (2,320 miles). The two combine to form the longest
river system in North America.
 Water makes a good solvent with many sugar, salts and acids easily dissolving in it. On the
other hand oils and fats don’t mix well with water.
 The water cycle involves water evaporating (turning into a gas), rising to the sky, cooling and
condensing into tiny drops of water or ice crystals that we see as clouds, falling back to Earthas
rain, snow or hail before evaporating again and continuing the cycle. Learn more about the
water cycle.
 Water in the form of ice is found at the polar ice caps of the planet Mars, some scientists have
also suggested the possibility of liquid water on the red planet.

3.  Pure water has no smell and no taste, it also has a pH level around 7.
 While most people know that water boils at 100 °C (212 °F), this is at the normal conditions of
sea level. The boiling point of water actually changes relative to the barometric pressure. For
example, water boils at just 68 °C (154 °F) on the top of Mount Everest while water deep in the
ocean near geothermal vents can remain in liquid form at temperatures much higher than
100 °C (212 °F).
 Water expands as it cools from 4 °C to 0 °C (above 4 °C it does the opposite). In freezing
conditions, water has been known to burst water pipes as it freezes to ice.
 Water can move up narrow tubes against the force of gravity in what is known as capillary
action. Check out this capillary action experiment for more.
 Most people around the world have access to clean drinking water but it is a major problem in
poorer areas of the world. Water pollution and low quality water can lead to dangerous bacteria,
disease and viruses such as E coli and Cryptosporidium.
 Drinking water is needed for humans to avoid dehydration, the amount you need each day
depends on the temperature, how much activity you are involved in and other factors.
 An important use for water is in agricultural irrigation, this is when water is artificially added to
soil in order to assist the growth of crops.
 Water is used frequently by firefighters to extinguish fires. Helicopters sometimes drop large
amount of water on wildfires and bushfires to stop fires spreading and limit the damage they
can cause.
 The water industry helps deliver water to homes in various cities and countries around the
world. This can involve services such as purification, sewage treatment, filtering, distillation and
plumbing.
 Electricity can be created from hydropower, a process that uses water to drive water turbines
connected to generators. There are many hydroelectric power stations around the world.
 Water also plays a role in cooking. Steaming and boiling food are well known cooking methods.
You may have noticed this last time you made pasta or noodles.
 Water is also used for fun. Water sports are a very popular recreational activity and include
things like swimming, surfing and waterskiing. Ice and snow is also used in ice skating, ice
hockey, skiing and snowboarding.
 Water is the most important resource in the world. Here are 100 amazing facts about water
that you may not know.
 68.7% of the fresh water on Earth is trapped
in glaciers.1
 30% of fresh water is in the ground.1
 1.7% of the world’s water is frozen and therefore unusable.1
 Approximately 400 billion gallons of water are used in the United States per day.1
 Nearly one-half of the water used by Americans is used for thermoelectric power
generation.1
 In one year, the average American residence uses over 100,000 gallons (indoors and
outside).1
 Water can dissolve more substances than any other liquid including sulfuric acid.1
 The freezing point of water lowers as the amount of salt dissolved in at increases. With
average levels of salt, seawater freezes at -2 °C (28.4 °F).2
 About 6,800 gallons of water is required to
grow a day’s food for a family of four.3
 To create one pint of beer it takes 20 gallons of water.3

4.  780 million people lack access to an improved water source.4
 In just one day, 200 million work hours are consumed by women collecting water for their
families.4
 1/3 what the world spends on bottled water in one year could pay for projects providing
water to everyone in need.4
 Unsafe water kills 200 children every hour.4
 Water weighs about 8 pounds a gallon.5
 It takes 120 gallons of water for one egg.5
 A jellyfish and a cucumber are each 95% water.5
 70% of the human brain is water.5
 80% of all illness in the developing world is water related.6
 Up to 50% of water is lost through leaks in cities in the developing world.6
 In Nairobi urban poor pay 10 times more for water than in New York.6
 In some countries, less than half the population has access to clean water.7
 $260 billion is the estimated annual economic loss from poor water and sanitation in
developing countries.7
 40 billion hours are spent collecting water in Africa alone.7
 The average cost for water supplied to a home in the U.S. is about $2.00 for 1,000 gallons,
which equals about 5 gallons for a penny.8
 A person can live about a month without food, but only about a week without water.8
 Water expands by 9% when it freezes.8
 There is about the same amount of water on Earth nowas there was millions of years ago.9
 The length of the side of a cube which could hold the Earth’s estimated total volume of
water in km = 1150.10
 Children in the first 6 months of life consume
seven times as much water per pound as the
average American adult.11
 Americans drink more than one billion glasses of tap water per day.11
 The United States draws more than 40 billion gallons (151 million liters) of water from the
Great Lakes every day—half of which is used for electrical power production.12
 85% of the world population lives in the driest half of the planet.13
 Agriculture accounts for ~70% of global freshwater withdrawals (up to 90% in some fast-
growing economies).13
 Various estimates indicate that, based on business as usual, ~3.5 planets Earth would be
needed to sustain a global population achieving the current lifestyle of the average
European or North American.13
 Thirty-six states are anticipating water shortages by 2016.14
 300 tons of water are required to manufacture 1 ton of steel.15
 1 in 6 gallons of water leak from utility pipes before reaching customers in the US.15
 American use 5.7 billion gallons per day from toilet flushes.15
 Refilling a half-liter water bottle 1,740 times with tap water is the equivalent cost of a 99
cent water bottle at a convenience store.15
 It takes about 12 gallons per day to sustain a human (this figure takes into account all uses
for water, like drinking, sanitation and food production).16

5.  Each day, we also lose a little more than a
cup of water (237 ml) when we exhale it.17
 By 2025, water withdrawals are predicted to increase by 50 percentin developing countries
and 18 percent in developed countries.18
 By 2025 half the world’s people will live in countries with high water stress.19
 A water-efficient dishwasher uses as little as 4 gallons per cycle but hand washing dishes
uses 20 gallons of water.20
 The average family of four uses 180 gallons of water per day outdoors. It is estimated that
over 50% is wasted from evaporation, wind, or overwatering.20
 It takes more than twice the amount of water to produce coffee than it does tea.21
 Chicken and goat are the least water intensive meats to consume.21
 There have been 265 recorded incidences of water conflicts from 3000 BC to 2012.21
 Hot water can freeze faster than cold water
under some conditions (commonly known as
the Mpemba effect).22
 If the entire world’s water were fit into a 4 liter jug, the fresh water available for us would
equal only about one tablespoon.23
 Over 90% of the world’s supply of fresh water is located in Antarctica.23
 Water regulates the Earth’s temperature.23
 On average, 10 gallons per day of your water footprint (or 14% of your indoor use) is lost
to leaks.24
 The average pool takes 22,000 gallons of water to fill.24
 It takes about 70 gallons of water to fill a bathtub.25
 Flying from Los Angeles to San Francisco,about700 miles round-trip,could cost you more
than 9,000 gallons of water.25
 Water use has grown at more than twice the rate of population increase in the last
century.26
 Only 0.007 percent of the planet’swater is available to fuel and feed its 6.8 billion people.26
 Three quarters of all Americans live within 10 miles of polluted water.27
 A swimming pool naturally loses about 1,000
gallons (3,785 liters) a month to
evaporation.28
 Producing a gallon (3.79 liters) of corn ethanol consumes 170 gallons (644 liters) of water
in total, from irrigation to final processing. On the other hand, the water requirement to
make a gallon of regular gasoline is just five gallons (19 liters).28
 40% of freshwater withdrawals in the United States are used for agriculture.29
 65% of freshwater withdrawals in China are used for agriculture.29
 Freshwater withdrawals for agriculture exceed 90% in many countries: Cambodia 94%,
Pakistan 94%, Vietnam 95%, Madagascar 97%, Iran 92%, Ecuador 92%.29
 If everyone in the US flushed the toilet just one less time per day, we could save a lake full
of water about one mile long, one mile wide and four feet deep.30

6.  If everyone in the US used just one less gallon of water per shower every day, we could
save some 85 billion gallons of water per year.30
 Over 42,000 gallons of water (enough to fill a 30×50 foot swimming pool) are needed to
grow and prepare food for a typical Thanksgiving dinner for eight.31
 An acre of corn will give off 4,000 gallons of water per day in evaporation.31
 In a 100-year period, a water molecule spends 98 years in the ocean, 20 months as ice,
about 2 weeks in lakes and rivers, and less than a week in the atmosphere.31
 Water is the most common substance found on earth.31
 In Washington state alone, glaciers provide
1.8 trillion liters (470 billion gallons) of water
each summer.32
 Water makes up about 66 percent of the human body.33
 There are no scientific studies that supportthe recommendation to drink 8 glasses of water
per day.33
 Drinking too much water can be fatal (known as water intoxication).33
 There is more fresh water in the atmosphere than in all of the rivers on the planet
combined.34
 If all of the water vapor in the Earth’s atmosphere fell at once, distributed evenly, it would
only cover the earth with about an inch of water.34
 It takes seven and a half years for the average American residence to use the same
amount of water that flows over the Niagara Falls in one second (750,000 gallons).34
 263 rivers either cross or demarcate international political boundaries.35
 Of the estimated 1.4 billion hectares of crop land worldwide, around 80 percent is rainfed
and accounts for about 60 percent of global agricultural output (the other 40% of output is
from irrigated crop land).36
 Household leaks can waste more than 1
trillion gallons annually nationwide. That’s
equal to the annual household water use of
more than 11 million homes.37
 Ten percent of homes have leaks that waste 90 gallons or more per day.37
 A leaky faucet that drips at the rate of one drip per second can waste more than 3,000
gallons per year.37
 Each cubic foot of Martian soil contains around two pints of liquid water, though the
molecules are not freely accessible, but rather bound to other minerals in the soil.38
 There is an estimated 326 million trillion gallons of water on earth.39
 NASA has discovered water in the form of ice on the moon.40
 A 2.6 billion year old pocket of water was discovered in a mine, 2 miles below the earth’s
surface.41

7.  Two-thirds of the world’s population is
projected to face water scarcity by 2025,
according to the United Nations.42
 1 pound of beef requires 1,799 gallons of water.43
 1 gallon of wine requires 1,008 gallons of water.43
 A 0.3 pound burger requires 660 gallons of water.43
 1 slice of bread requires 11 gallons of water.43
 1 apple requires 18 gallons of water.43
 1 pound of chocolate requires 3,170 gallons of water.43
 500 sheets of paper requires 1,321 gallons of water.43
 Ground water occurs almost everywhere beneath the land surface. The widespread
occurrence of potable ground water is the reason that it is used as a source of water supply
by about one-half the population of the United States.44
 Hydrologists estimate, according to the National Geographic Society, U.S. groundwater
reserves to be at least 33,000 trillion gallons — equal to the amount discharged into the
Gulf of Mexico by the Mississippi River in the past 200 years.45
 At any given moment, groundwater is 20 to 30 times greater than the amount in all the
lakes, streams, and rivers of the United States.45
 About 27 trillion gallons of groundwater are withdrawn for use in the U.S. each year.46
 The High Plains Aquifer covers eight states
and 175,000 miles.