Credit 96dpi via Flickr

Like most Canadians over the years I’ve been told of our abundant freshwater resources, and how we are one of the richest countries when it comes to fresh water resources. Numerous reports have been publishes that put our global fresh water share at varying amounts; 25%, 20% and so on. Either way many people would agree, we have an abundance of fresh water. Or do we?

Upon closer examination it becomes clear that only a fraction of the fresh water we currently have is renewable. Again there are varying stats but I’ve read numbers such as only 7%, 9% etc of our national fresh water supply is renewable. That means most of our fresh water is tied into non renewable resources such as glaciers, icebergs and other resources that are in retreat. Withe the onset of global warming it only speeds up the diminishing nature of these non renewable resources.

Many climate and water experts now believe that water scarcity in many countries will reach a global crisis in the latter part of this century, wich raises the possbility of conflict in certain parts of the world.

The myth of abundant, never ending fresh water seems so tied to our public psyche here in Canada that most of us take it for granted. Perhaps that’s why Canadians are amongst the top consumers of fresh water per capita in the world. In fact Canadians use more than twice the water people in Europe use.

But it doesn’t have to be this way, with simple steps we can reduce our consumption. GoBlue.org is a site created by Unilever canada, it discusses the issues above in detail and gives tips on how you can reduce your water consumption in your home.

Visit GoBlue.org
More stats on Canadian water use in Canada

Free Flow Turbine

When someone says hydro power, most of us think large concrete structures holding back million of gallons of water to generate electricity. But what if there was another way to use a river’s natural currents to produce electricity? Possible without placing large concrete structures within a biosphere and disrupting the natural currents or water mass? Among solar panels, and wind turbines is another technology that has potential to generate power for cities adjacent to moving bodies of water: Free Flow Underwater Turbines.

Very simply, it works like a wind turbine along the bed of a river, but the blades are moved by a water current instead of by the wind. The turbine blades rotate slowly allowing fish to pass through safely with minimal environmental impact. One of the disadvantages of wind turbines are days when there is no wind or it’s not sufficient to generate power, not so with free flow turbines, since the current runs all day every day there is no period where the turbine is inactive.

Last year Ontario invested 2.2 million into the Cornwall Ontario River Energy project, it’s goal to develop 15MW of power as a demonstration of the feasibility and commercial viability of free flow underwater turbines.

More info on these unique turbines
Information about the C.O.R.E project in Ontario

VBS.tv Video Series

We all know the problems plastics pose, their resource use as a petroleum and chemical product, the leeching of chemicals, and the problem with waste once the product they make up is no longer needed.

However one problem that isn’t as widely know is how everyday products are infiltrating our waterways slowly making their way into our Oceans and collecting in the north pacific. The most widely know of these spots is the North Pacific Gyre, aka the North Pacific Garbage Patch.

The Gyre is a slowly moving, clockwise spiral of currents created by a high-pressure system of air currents in the norther pacific ocean. The area is an oceanic desert , filled with tiny phytoplankton but few big fish or mammals. Due to its lack of large fish and gentle breezes, fishermen and­ s­ailors rarely travel through the gyre. But the area is filled with something besides plankton: trash, millions of pounds of it, most of it plastic. It’s the largest landfill in the world, and it floats in the middle of the ocean.

VBS.tv has presented a 12 part documentary on the gyre, each episode lasting about 5 minutes give or take. It’s a little slow in the middle and there is some swearing but I think the message is what’s important and in the end they show the average person just what we are putting in our ocean.

Captain Charles Moore has dedicated himself to exposing the gyre and studying it effects. Towards the end he reflects on the gyre and what it says about us as a society, here are his thoughts:

Critical thinking it’s  a faculty that’s in danger in our present day society. We live in the happy consciousness era. We’re the strongest nation on earth (the US), globalization is inevitable, we’ve got more stuff, he who dies with the most toys wins.

I think that’s why I’m so gung-ho on this plastic thing, because it’s a symbol of the wrong direction we’re taking as a society as a whole. What is the promise of society? Descartes said there was such a thing as a social contract. That we give up our individual liberties to the society as a whole because it can liberate us greater than we could do by ourselves. Is that still the case? Are we getting the bang for the buck out of our society and our social institutions that we gave up our anarchistic tendencies for? We’re caught in the trade winds of our time, we can’t succeed from society, but we have to plant the seed of the future in the present.

Warning: this video series uses some coarse language.
Watch the VBS.tv series

More on the north pacific gyre:
Treehugger article on the gyre

Credit: Shrff14 via Flickr

With the amount of money we spend on bottled water we could bring fresh water to all the people in the world who need it. The American people, including most western nations, have been conned into thinking that bottled water is healthier than tap water. In fact the regulations for tap water in the US are much stiffer than for bottled water in most situations. The same is true of most western countries and as regulations pass in other parts of the world the same holds true there as well.

Bottled water costs about a thousand times as much as tap water. We complain about the higher prices of gasoline but we’ll pay even more for water that’s often inferior to what we can get from the tap.

And this doesn’t take into account the environmental impact from bottled water. Oil is used to produce the plastic bottles and even more oil and energy is consumed transporting and distributing a product that we can get from our taps for next to nothing per liter.

Bottled water is one of the easiest items to remove from your carbon footprint. Get a reusable canteen such as a sigg or kleen kanteen and open the tap. If you don’t like the taste of your water get a Brita pitcher and filter your water. While Brita filters have their own environmental issues, such as distribution and adding to landfills, they aren’t as significant as those presented by bottled water.

For more on bottled water and related issues follow the links below:
Treehugger: A world of reasons to ditch bottled water
Earth Policy Institute: Pouring Resources Down the Drain

Lester Brown

Lester Brown knows a thing or two about the challenges we face globally. To paraphrase the introduction to the presentation by Doug Fine, about Lester Brown Doug states “His (Lester Brown’s)  report and now book “Who will feed China?” Did what no threatened Olympic boycott could, it scared the countries leaders into changing policy.” The Washington Post called him “one of the world’s most influential thinkers”.

In this presentation Lester goes over some the of the most pressing challenges we face globally over the coming decades, what he outlines is alarming and enlightening. It would be easy to simply want to give up if you stopped listening after the first third of his presentation, but that would be a mistake. In his measured and carefully prepared manner Lester outlines what we can do to avoid some of these problems. It leaves you with a feeling that something can be done. But his most important point is saved for the end, Lester urges us all to get involved:

“Saving civilization is not a spectator sport we all need to get involved”

Listen to Lester’s presentation
The earth Policy Institute

Credit: icelight via flickr

Sylvia Earle is an American oceanographer. She was chief scientist for the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from 1990-1992.

In a recent TED speech she enthusiastically presented the impact humans have had and are having on the oceans. She speaks about what is needed to stop our over cultivation of this vital resource. Sylvia has spent her life tracking, learning and protecting the oceans. Admittedly most of us do not consider what part the oceans play in creating a sustainable environment. But they play a critical role in stabilizing the planet for all creatures, even those not close to a coast.

In her presentation she explains in great detail how we have over cultivated 90% of the large fish stocks in the seas. How we are killing off major oceanic zones and depleting life in the seas, and ultimately how the health of the oceans affects us all, since a vast majority of the air we breath is generated by the oceans, and the ocean is key in creating a stable climate for our planet.

She ends with an impassioned plea for people to create marine protected areas, much like we have with our national parks, to help reverse the loss of biodiversity.

Click here to watch Sylvia Earle’s TED talk.