Water
The Hydrologic Cycle
“Whiskey’s for drinking, water’s
for fighting over.”
Western saying
The Critical Need: Water
Global Water
• Ocean (Salty) 97.2 %
• Fresh Water 2.8 %
– Ice 2.15%
– Liquid 0.65%
• Groundwater 0.62%
• Lakes 0.009%
• Soil Moisture 0.005%
• Streams and Rivers 0.001%
• Atmosphere 0.0001%
Why Not Use Sea Water?
• Desalination now provides 1% of world
drinking water
• Distillation (Energy intensive)
• Passive distillation (Slow, inefficient)
• Reverse Osmosis (Filters delicate, prone to
clogging and contamination)
• Towing Antarctic Icebergs (Not done yet,
but the numbers are promising)
Surface Water, Bosnia
Dams
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Irrigation
Urban water supply
Hydroelectric power
Flood control
Recreation
Impacts of Dams
• Human dislocation
• Habitat Destruction
– Terrestrial
– Aquatic
– Disruption of natural cycles
• Sediment Starvation
• Increased Evaporation
• Conflict
– Division of Water
– Denial as weapon
Yangtze Gorge
Three Gorges Dam, China
Three Gorges Dam, China
Three Gorges Dam, China
Three Gorges Dam Locks
Three Gorges Dam Locks
Open Spillway
Sierra Foothills, California
O’Shaugnessy Dam, California
O’Shaugnessy Dam, California
O’Shaugnessy Dam, California
Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, California
Owens Valley, California
Mono Lake, California
Tufa Pinnacles, Mono Lake
San Bernardino, California
The Aral Sea
Prehistoric Aral Sea?
The Aral Sea
• Once world’s 4th largest lake
• Roughly area of Lake Michigan, but only
20% of its volume
• Complex history of natural diversion and
dessication
• Pleistocene filling from north?
• Fed only by Syr Darya until Holocene
• Amu Darya captured ca. 10,000 years ago.
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral
Sea
19572006
Aral Sea,
2006
Aral Sea,
2009
The Aral Sea Disaster
• Effects
– < ¼ of original area
– Destruction of fisheries
– Respiratory illness from wind-blown salts
• Solutions?
– Ideally, stop irrigating
– Dam off northern lakes and restore
– Canal from Siberia?
Some Places Have Too Much Water
New Orleans
Dangers of Cheap Work
Missed It By That Much
That
Much
Aquifers
Impacts of Groundwater Use
• Aquifer depletion
• Lowering of water table
– Drying of wells
– Danger to springs and wetlands
• Invasion of contaminants
• Ground subsidence
Green Bay Case Study
Deep Aquifers of the Green Bay Area
Green Bay Groundwater
Pumping 1880-1960
Green
Bay
Water
Table
18801960
Green Bay Piezometric Surface
1957
1960
Green Bay Piezometric Surface
1957
2003
Pumping and Water Table
Center-Pivot Irrigation
Center-Pivot Irrigation
The Russian Radioactive Waste
Injection Program
The Russian Radioactive Waste
Injection Program
Soluble Rocks
Karst, Turkey
Karst, Paraguay
Sinkholes, Bosnia
Sinkhole From Below
Sacred Cenote, Chichen Itza
A Scene
From
Traditional
Chinese Art
Karst, China
Karst in Wisconsin
Problems in Karst Landscapes
• Extremely fast water (and contaminant)
movement
• Long-range connections
• Unanticipated connections
Geothermal Systems: Mammoth
Hot Springs, Yellowstone
Yellowstone Canyon
San Juan Mountains, Colorado
Old Faithful
Geyser,
Yellowstone
High Plains (Ogalalla) Aquifer
• 27% of all irrigated land in U.S. overlies
aquifer
• 30% of U.S. ground water used in irrigation
comes from this aquifer
• 80% of the population in the aquifer area
rely on it for drinking water
• Withdrawal = 12 km3/yr = 18 Colorado
Rivers
High Plains
Aquifer
Saturated
Thickness
1997
Geology
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Pliocene-Miocene sediments (2-6 m.y.)
Eroded off Rocky Mountains
Open (unconfined) aquifer
Depth to water: 30m in S to 130 m in N
Original water volume in aquifer about
3900 km3
• 2005 volume: 3600 km3
Drawdown
1980-1995
California Central Valley
Continental Sediment Thickness
Drawdown 1860-1960
Recovery 1960-1976
Land Subsidence
Land
Subsidence,
Mendota, CA
The Okeefenokee Swamp
The Okeefenokee Swamp
The Okeefenokee Swamp
The Okeefenokee Swamp
The Everglades
Radar Image
of South
Florida
Airliner View
The Everglades
Mangroves
Limestone in the Making
Diversion Structure, Everglades