GOAL 6 : CLEAN WATER AND SANITATION

GOAL 6 : Clean water and Sanitation

As societies become more economically prosperous and formally educated, they will be better able to create modern water and sanitation facilities and systems. In many societies, girls can spend as many as 15 hours per week fetching water for their families, leaving little or no time for school. Similarly, without knowledge of access to safe sanitation, there are many more sick children who will miss school. Educated households are also more likely to use different methods of water purification through filtering or boiling. In urban India, the probability of purification increased by 9% when the most educated adult had completed primary education and by 22% when the most educated adult had completed secondary education. Many schools in poorer countries lack adequate water and sanitation facilities, affecting children’s educations and even claiming lives as 1.5 million children under the age of five die every year of diarrhea due to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and lack of hygiene. With nearly 300 million school days missed worldwide due to diarrhea, better water, sanitation, and hygiene is needed to reverse the trend. Improved hygiene will lead to less risk of disease, which in turn will result in more consistent school attendance and ultimately a nation’s economic growth.

Water,Climate change and Ecosystems

A mere 0.5°C difference in temperature change could significantly impact water systems and human health

Climate change is already affecting both the availability and quality of water resources. On a warming planet, extreme and irregular weather events such as floods and drought are expected to only become more frequent. Warmer river and lake temperatures will reduce dissolved oxygen in the water, and make habitats more lethal for the fish that rely on it to breathe. Warming waters are also more prolific incubators of harmful algae and cyanobacteria that are toxic for aquatic life and for humans. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C, published in late 2018, noted that by limiting the global average temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, instead of 2°C, we could significantly reduce the risk of severe negative outcomes for ecosystems and human development. If the temperature increase was limited to 1.5°C sea level rise by the year 2100 would be 10 centimetres lower than it would be at a 2°C increase – posing less of a threat to coastal cities, and lessening the risk of severe heat waves and torrential storms.

A mere half-degree of extra warming above 1.5°C would also mean a ten-fold increase in ice-free summers in the Arctic and a doubling of the rate of crop loss, according to the report. It also identified important links between climate change and safe drinking water access – and cautioned that socio-economic factors like governance and wealth play significant, related roles. Tropical forests, ocean systems and corals, and wetlands are particularly vulnerable. More extreme variation in rainfall and drought are likely in both a 1.5°C and 2°C scenario; in many cases, more warmth will lessen the quality and quantity of water for agriculture and other human activity. Limiting warming to 1.5°C will be difficult, but possible, according to the IPCC – though its report indicated that breakthroughs in carbon sequestration technology may be necessary to complement existing emissions-reduction efforts. Emerging technologies and adaptation can help reduce vulnerability to climate change, and increase the resilience of water resources and systems. Further research is needed in order to increase awareness and understanding of climate change generally, and to better adapt to it.

Water’s role in Human and Environment Health

The world’s supply of fresh water, crucial for health and for preventing the spread of diseases like COVID-19, is at risk

About three in 10 people worldwide do not have access to safe drinking water from a home faucet, according to a World Health Organization report published in 2017. More than 4.5 billion people lack sanitary toilet facilities. Dirty water sickens and kills millions of people annually as a result of waterborne diseases; according to the WHO, roughly 361,000 children under the age of five die every year due to diarrhoea. Globally, only 60% of households have both water and soap for handwashing, a first line of defense against the spread of COVID-19 and other diseases. Just 2% of hospitals and healthcare facilities in 78 low- and middle-income countries have the complete hygienic package of running water, adequate toilets, waste disposal, and handwashing equipment, according to a University of North Carolina study. Because substances readily dissolve into water (often dubbed the “universal solvent”), it is often where pollutants end up. Aquifers (layers of permeable rock and sand that store water underground), rivers, and tap water can all become potentially dangerous conduits for the chemical and bacterial markers of their surroundings.

These markers can include lead from pipes; industrial solvents from manufacturing facilities; mercury from unlicensed gold mines; viruses from animal waste; and nitrates and pesticides from farm fields. The world’s ecosystems are put at risk due to the degradation and extraction of water. Algal blooms fuelled by fertilizers are a growing global menace killing fish, turning away tourists, contaminating drinking water, and depressing property values. Water withdrawals, unsustainable development, and a changing climate have also taken a toll; large lakes such as Lake Chad, with a basin shared by five countries in Africa’s Sahel, and Lake Urmia, in Iran, are shrinking. About 30 million people live in the Lake Chad Basin alone, which provides fresh water for irrigation and drinking. Important marsh ecosystems are also declining – as much as half of the world’s wetlands have been filled in, and wetland loss has accelerated in recent decades. In addition, dams have been constructed that slice rivers into segments – a habitat fragmentation that has decimated salmon in the Pacific Northwest in the US, and fisheries in the Mekong River Basin in Asia.

Water Data and Technology

Emerging technologies can help curb water waste and better monitor water systems

The speed and scale of technological advancements propelling the Fourth Industrial Revolution are transforming the global economy at a time when concerns about water have never been greater. This industrial revolution offers an unprecedented opportunity to confront water risk, and seize untapped economic opportunities in both developing and developed countries alike. Developments such as the Internet of Things, the efficient use of big data, artificial intelligence, sensors, advancements in material sciences, and faster computing power are changing the way the world manages its global environmental commons. For example, improvements in aeroponics, a technique of growing plants that does not require soil, has made it possible to reduce water consumption by 95% compared with more conventional, soil-based agriculture – while also preventing environmental runoff, which can carry pollutants and contaminate drinking water. In addition, advancements in laboratory-grown meat have the potential to eliminate the need for the more than 15,000 litres of water that it takes to produce a single kilogram of beef, according to a report published by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in 2013.

Emerging technologies can also help urban centres become more resilient when it comes to their water systems. Singapore, for example, announced in 2018 that in order to help its water service cope with increasing demand and costs, the city-state is turning to technology such as artificial intelligence-powered imaging used to detect micro-invertebrates in water samples – and trigger related alerts. Other examples of technology and data-driven infrastructure design employed to make water more sustainable include efforts in parts of the United Kingdom to use advanced sensors and connected Internet of Things devices to help identify leaks in water systems – which account for nearly 20% of water loss – and make them easier to repair. If they are implemented on a broader scale, such advancements could dramatically reduce global water demand, both for agriculture and for domestic use, while also helping reduce related greenhouse gas emissions. Developments in data processing and collection, driven by artificial intelligence, could readily enable people, businesses, and governments to better understand their water needs – and eliminate unnecessary use.

Water and Energy

Better managing water use can result in more efficient and environmentally-beneficial energy use

Energy production based on fossil fuels and nuclear power requires large volumes of water – and the heating, transportation, purification, and use of water consumes vast amounts of energy. Policies that successfully account for both energy and water use can have multiple benefits. For example, an urban water conservation mandate implemented during a drought in California resulted in electricity savings 11% greater than what was achieved by electric utility efficiency programs during the same period – while cutting greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 111,000 cars on the road for a full year. The fossil fuel economy is water-intensive and dirty; waste products from burning coal send toxic heavy metals into groundwater and rivers. Water demand for fracking in the US has soared – by as much as 770% per well between 2011 and 2016 in the Permian Basin – potentially severely limiting local freshwater availability. Thermal power plants account for more water withdrawals (used for cooling) than any other sector in the US, though much of it is returned (at a warmer temperatures) to rivers and lakes.

Still, these plants rely on consistent river flows and temperatures, so extreme variations can be disruptive. Severe droughts in France and in the southern US have resulted in power plant deratings or shutdowns when river temperatures become too hot. Some alternative energy options also have drawbacks; ethanol-based biofuels require land and water to grow corn, switchgrass, and other feedstocks, for example. The reservoirs associated with hydropower dams in arid regions lose substantial amounts of water to evaporation, while dams in tropical regions generate methane emissions. In terms of energy use for water treatment and purification, Saudi Arabia dedicates 10% of domestic oil consumption to desalinating water, according to estimates, while in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates desalination accounts for roughly 30% of electricity use. Wind turbines and solar panels, by contrast, require little to no water to produce electricity. Energy choices can have serious consequences for water availability and need to be tailored to specific challenges that vary by region. Even policies designed to mitigate climate change, such as carbon capture, can potentially exacerbate water scarcity.