• Large-scale production of algae-based biofuels poses sustainability concerns

    Scaling up the production of biofuels made from algae to meet at least 5 percent — approximately thirty-nine billion liters — of U.S. transportation fuel needs would place unsustainable demands on energy, water, and nutrients, says a new report from the National Research Council; these concerns, however, are not a definitive barrier for future production, and innovations that would require research and development could help realize algal biofuels’ full potential

  • Ozone causes forests to use more water, reducing availability in the Southeast

    Scientists have found that rising levels of ozone, a greenhouse gas, may amplify the impacts of higher temperatures and reduce streamflow from forests to rivers, streams, and other water bodies; such effects could potentially reduce water supplies available to support forest ecosystems and people in the southeastern United States

  • The Western hemisphere’s largest seawater desalination plant to be built in California

    The San Diego County Water Authority announced plans to build the Western hemisphere’s largest seawater desalination plant; the plant will produce fifty million gallons of fresh water per day, enough to supply about 7 percent of the San Diego region in 2020

  • Trading water: the pros and cons

    Water is a commodity, and water rights can be freely traded in an open market. Proponents of the free market approach argue that it leads to the most efficient allocation of water resources, as it would for any other commodity

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  • More ways to combat water shortages

    Water is the one element that every breathing, living organism on Earth needs, and unlike oil, there are no viable alternatives; in many undeveloped countries, water is becoming scarce. Concerns are growing about the availability of water in developed countries as well

  • Desalination losing ground as a solution to California’s chronic water shortage

    According to the July 2011 census, more than thirty-seven million people live in California, increasing the pressure on the state’s water sources; desalinating sea water as a solution to the scarcity of fresh water is not a new technology — it has been around for more than four decades — but it has more recently been considered as a way to address California’s chronic, and growing, water shortage; a closer examination of the technology and its cost has cooled the initial enthusiasm for it

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  • Exploring solutions to growing water shortages

    Most Americans do not pay much attention to how much water they use when they take a shower or when they water the grass, but Michael Sullivan, a global executive at IBM thinks this will change; “Water is a finite resource,” Sullivan told a panel in a conference on water policy; “What we’re dealing with is that there’s a finite supply, and as the population grows and industry grows, we’re stressing that finite supply”

  • Nanotechnology sensor detects mercury in water, fish

    When mercury is dumped into rivers and lakes, the toxic heavy metal can end up in the fish we eat and the water we drink; to help protect consumers from the diseases and conditions associated with mercury, researchers have developed a nanoparticle system that is sensitive enough to detect even the smallest levels of heavy metals in our water and fish

  • Many Americans exposed to drinking water-related gastrointestinal illness

    More than 100 million people in the United States rely on water piped into homes, schools, and businesses from public water systems that get their water from wells, rather than lakes, rivers, and other above-ground sources; much of that water either is not disinfected at all or is not adequately disinfected to kill disease-causing viruses

  • Students create low-cost biosensor to detect contaminated water

    Diarrheal disease is the second-leading cause of death in children under five years old — killing as many as 1.5 million children worldwide every year; these startling statistics from the World Health Organization (2009) point to the reason why a group of undergraduate students from Arizona State University is working to develop a low-cost biosensor — a simple device that would detect contaminated drinking water

  • Trade-offs between water for food and for curbing climate change

    Earth’s growing human population needs fresh water for drinking and food production. Fresh water, however, is also needed for the growth of biomass, which acts as a sink of carbon dioxide and thus could help mitigate climate change. Does the Earth have enough freshwater resources to meet these competing demands?

  • Water research thrives as discrepancy between supply and demand for water grows

    The growing discrepancy between supply and demand for water is becoming more challenging each year; developments in water research have the potential to help solve this issue; a new report examines the dynamics of global water research between 2007 and 2011; the analysis highlights the role interdisciplinary and international collaboration plays in the production of high impact water research

  • Bacteria in tap water traced to the water treatment process

    Most of the bacteria that remain in drinking water when it gets to the tap can be traced to filters used in the water treatment process, rather than to the aquifers or rivers where they originated; the findings could open the door to more sustainable water treatment processes that use fewer chemicals and, as a result, produce lower levels of byproducts that may pose health risks; eventually, the work could enable engineers to control the types of microbes in drinking water to improve human health

  • Toilet Challenge, 1: Caltech’s solar-powered toilet wins Reinvent Toilet Challenge

    The World Health Organization reports that 2.5 billion people around the globe are without access to sanitary toilets, which results in the spread of deadly diseases; every year, 1.5 million people, mostly those under the age of five, die from diarrhea; Caltech scientist awarded grant to develop solar-powered sanitation system

  • Toilet Challenge, 2: Loughborough’s hydrocarbonization design wins second Reinvent the Toilet Challenge prize

    Researchers from Loughborough University, located in Leicestershire, United Kingdom , won second prize in the Reinvent the Toilet Challenge; their toilet uses a process called Continuous Thermal Hydrocarbonization which kills all pathogens to create safe to handle, valuable material and uses power from heat generated during processing