Quote:
Originally Posted by Rain Man
Here's a naive question about water.
We're a closed system. When we drink water it doesn't cease to exist. We sweat it out or we urinate in jdubya's back yard and it goes into that whole evaporate-rise-condense-fall cycle. So theoretically we should never run out of water; we should just cycle it faster, right?
I guess there are some practical issues. Maybe some sinks into the mantle or gets salty or something. But on the other hand, we know the reciped for water and as far as I know there's a lot of hydrogen and oxygen floating around.
|
Most of that has to do with locational drought. It's not that we run out of water overall. The problem is that some specific locations that need water the most don't have a chance to refill because of drought conditions. Lack of water in one location results in excess water in other locations. So it evens out overall, but some locations are still screwed. Lots of farming depends directly on natural sources like Lake Mead for yearly needs. Continued drought over a matter of years has decimated many sources like this just because of specifically regional lack of rainfall. Rainfall just shifts to a different location.