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AQUA-VERITAS
Water Purification & Desalination
Global Water Shortage
Water covers 70% of our planet, however freshwater is incredibly rare. Only 3% of the world’s water is fresh water, and two-thirds of that is tucked away in frozen glaciers or otherwise unavailable for our use.
Many of the water systems that keep ecosystems thriving and feed a growing human population have become stressed. Rivers, lakes and aquifers are drying up or becoming too polluted to use. More than half the world’s wetlands have disappeared. Agriculture consumes more water than any other source and wastes much of that through inefficiencies. Climate change is altering patterns of weather and water around the world, causing shortages and droughts in some areas and floods in others.
Global Goals
The European Union has set a 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and has given a new impetus to global efforts for achieving sustainable development including set out Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Eurostat who are the statistical office of the European Union have provided the statistics below for SDG6.
SDG6 - Sustainable Development Goal 6 is: "Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all."
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Over the past 300 years over 85% of the Planet’s Wetlands have been lost.
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For at least 3 billion people the quality of water they depend on is unknown due to a lack of monitoring.
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733+ million people live in countries with high and critical levels of Water Stress (2019)
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Only one quarter of reporting countries have >90% of their Transboundary Waters covered by operational arrangements (2020)
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At current rates, in 2030:
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1.6 billion People will lack safely managed Drinking Water
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2.8 billion People will lack safely managed Sanitation
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1.9 billion People will lack Hygiene Facilities
Meeting Drinking Water, Sanitation and Hygiene targets by 2030 requires 4 times increase in the pace of progress.
Global Water Shortage
The Philippines
A typical example of a tropical countries difficulties to provide clean drinkable water are highlighted below in a brief summary of The Philippines.
The Philippines located in the Pacific Ocean has 7,100 islands and inhabitants are scattered across 2,000 of them. According to the World Health Organization, 1 in 10 people in the Philippines still do not have access to improved water sources and 7 million people still consume and utilize water from unsafe and unsustainable sources.
Over the years, the quality of water in the Philippines has worsened, predominantly in densely populated areas and regions of industrial and agricultural activity.
The Philippines government reported that only 36 percent of its rivers are classified as public water supply sources, and only 42 percent of its groundwater is free from contamination.
Many Filipinos rely on purchasing their water from commercial sources which can account for a high percentage of the average Filipino’s monthly wage.
Severe droughts occur in the Philippines each year (El Niño) causing water sources to dry up in some provinces as they experience tough dry spell conditions from March till June.
The Philippines suffers from annual natural catastrophes such as Typhoons, violent storms, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, flooding and landslides which cause access to existing water supplies to get wiped out during these natural disasters.
Deep wells were previously constructed to provide access to groundwater but over-extraction or excessive pumping can cause saltwater to move towards the groundwater extraction which contaminates the fresh water. This is an issue with the 2000 inhabited islands in the Philippines. Also, over extraction of groundwater can lower the water table. In 2015 The National Resources Board (NWRB) strictly prohibited Groundwater Extraction in many areas of the country and have shut down many deep wells.
October 2022, residents in the suburbs of Metro Manila with a population of more than 15 million have restricted access to household water.
