In our previous session we learned about what exactly is our
environment all about.
Where we studied the various components and the
four spheres.
2) WHAT IS HYDROSPHERE??
Friends do you know something?
If you view our planet earth from the space, it looks blue as major
part of the earths surface is covered with water and this is the
reason why Earth is known as water planet or blue planet.
And this
abundance of water is what distinguishes earth from other planets of
our solar system.
So guys lets know some more things about this interesting feature of
our earth that is our hydrosphere.
can you recollect the four spheres which we had mentioned in our
previous session??????
As we all know,
All the water on the surface, below the ground and surrounding the
earth comes under Hydrosphere.we see water is found in different forms
like in rivers, seas, oceans, snow, rain, glaciers, ice caps etc.
Here if we observe,
water is present in SOLID form In glaciers, snow, ice caps,
whereas, it exist in LIQUID form In rivers, seas, oceans, rainfall
Now can water be present in gaseous state??
Friends we all have seen the steam coming from the boiling water.
This
steam is water in its gaseous state.
So we can say water exists in all three states of matter: solid,
liquid and gas.
Now if we look at the distribution of water in different forms on our
earth
71% of our earth is covered with water and the remaining 29% is land.
Around 97% of this water is in seas and oceans and we call it as
marine water or saline water as it has more amount of dissolved salts
so its not fit for drinking.
And the remaining 3% is fresh water.
Here we call it as freshwater because the dissolved salt content is
very less and that is the reason why it is fit for drinking.
Of the
total fresh water (69%) major part is locked in glaciers and ice caps,
(30% )followed by underground water and just a small amnt (1%) is
located in rivers and lakes.
So we can compare this small portion of water with the total water
available on the earth surface it is just 0.03% which is available for
drinking.
And this is the reason why we must put efforts in conserving
water.
Here I remember the lines from the Rimes of Ancient Mariner
Water, water, everywhere..
But not a drop to drink it stands true completely in case of our planet
earth as we have seen
just now that a vast majority of our earth surface is covered by water
but only a small portion of which is fit for drinking.
4) WATER AS A RESOURCE:
Ok now let us look at how water acts a resource to us..
Water plays a crucial role in survival of living organisms on earth.
Where there is water, there is life.
It is Even believed that the
first form of life originated in water.
Its not just the earth that is majorly covered with water but do you
know water makes up approximately 70% of a humans body weight.
The average person could live without food for nearly a month, but it
would just be difficult for us to survive even for a week without
water thats how important water is to human life.
We call water as an important resource as we use it for various
purposes.
We can divide this into:
? Agricultural use- we all know that crops require water for their
growth and we provide this water to our fields by proper irrigation
facilities.
? Domestic use it simply implies the water which is required for
household use like for (drinking, washing, cooking, watering plants
etc).this water reaches to our homes through various water
distribution system.
? Industrial use-industries require a huge amount of water.
At various
levels of operation.
Friends we saw here that water has many different uses but does all
this water get exhausted as we use it?
If dat is the case then how
is this % of water on earth maintained even after so much usage?
water is replenished or recycled through a natural process which is
called water cycle.
Which we will be studying in our coming
session..
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