New research shows that persistent groundwater extraction over more than a decade has shifted the axis on which our planet rotates.
New research shows that persistent groundwater extraction over more than a decade has shifted the axis on which our planet rotates.
It’s difficult to quantify exactly how much human population has really grown. It’s estimated that the Black Plague took 20 to 25 million lives which was thought to be anywhere from 30% to 50% of global human population at the time, which was between 1348 to 1350. The estimated population in the 1600’s is roughly 500,000,000 (five hundred million humans). Roughly half of the population just 200 years later by the 1800’s, where we reached 1 billion people on the planet.
So in just over 200 years we have expanded 7 fold. Even adding up the entirety of the human population from 5,000 bce to 1100 A.D. is barely reaching the total amount of humans we have today.
For context, we’re at/near 8 billion now. A century ago, 1923, we had roughly 2 billion people.
The sheer amount of expansion we’ve had far outweighs total lives in human history. Multiple, multiple centuries of humans never even came close to amounting the resource draw which we have today - in part due to technology, in part because we’ve paved a way for more efficient destruction, and in part because we have multiplied our numbers.
So what solution would you propose?
Man made precipitation machines? Manually create the process of forming hydrogen and oxygen bonds? I have no idea. All I know is that the numbers of humans throughout history into our present day are very difficult to grasp exactly just how exponentially we’ve grown, which is mostly what I was referring to in regards to the sheer amount of resource draw it takes.
For water specifically - sustainable methods is our only real option. Removing the power that Nestle holds as a corporation over a human necessity would be another. That alone would give a plethora of small communities their natural springs and reservoirs back in addition to being one less thing fraking our water.
I also think smarter use of water. Plumbing shouldn’t really be using clean or grey water. I don’t know exactly what, but I know that pissing and shitting into a ever filtering water supply isn’t what it should be. Literally the entire system is fine except for the choice of fluid. Similarly, grey water should be much more widely used. Similar to these, these need to be implemented globally and used in tandem with existing methods. Bonus: theoretically it could have other resource gains and taking water from the ocean solves another issue with water levels rising.
If some of these sound insane or absurd, it’s because that’s just how fucked we are in terms of actual solutions. Right now we need to be thinking practically because that’s the only plausible, or rather feasible way of it being effective. The fact that our main solutions right now are reliant on hypothetical and prototyped technology doesn’t exactly bode well for our future. But hey, maybe the new land previously permafrosted in the arctic will reveal some new elements, fossils, and lost civilizations technologies! (/s)
That said, if mechanisms do get figured out and if they are effective, a combination of cleaned ocean water, man-made water, and reorienting current systems to be more sustainable we may actually have a chance at replenishing clean water supplies with surplus. However, I think the chances of the United States transitioning from clean water plumbing to some hypothetical non-existed replacement is more likely than Nestle ever losing an ounce of power. And honestly, that’s the most damning problem of all. Our solutions will not matter if corporations stay on course.