Friday, April 23, 2010

Frikity Friday

So back to the whole idea of having a taking a stand Friday type dealio....

And mixing it with some Earth Day lovin'.... brings us to....


Water.

Now, I believe in a lot of crazy stuff. Like bigfoot, and UFO sightings (or I want to believe), the ultimate power of the mind, dolphins that deliver babies, and a boat load of other crazy happen stance. But, I never could believe that we could ever run out of clean water. I just didn't get it, hello, it's called a water purifier, or some bleach. Dang, next I'll solve world hunger.

Thank you, please take a number.

But, then I watched this documentary:

FLOW

 

 


It really opened my eyes to a lot of facts. Such as:
  • Water is a $400 billion dollar global industry; the third largest behind electricity and oil.
    (source: CBS News, FLOW.)
  • The cost per person per year for having 10 liters of safe drinking water every day is just $6 USD.

    (Ashok Gadgil, Senior Staff Scientist in the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, FLOW)
  • 3.575 million people die each year from water-related disease. (water.org)
  • The water and sanitation crisis claims more lives through disease than any war claims through guns. (water.org)
  • $4 billion -- estimated annual sales of the U.S. bottled water industry (PANDA.org)
  • A Canadian study notes that a one-litre brand-name bottle of flat water costs about $1.50.
    That's about 3,000 times more expensive than an equal amount of municipal tap water.
  • 3/10th of 1% of all the world's water is usable by humans
  • Women, usually responsible for hauling water when plumbing is absent,

    on average carry 45 pounds of water at a time.
  • Global sales of bottled water reached $100 billion in 2005.
  • The cost to provide clean drinking water to half the 1.1 billion who need it is between $10 and $30 billion a year.
  • The NRDC tested 103 bottled waters and found over 25% were simply tap water. Several tested failed the bacteria test. (All other fact sources from friendsofwater.com)
  • 90% of the cost of a bottle of water is for label, cap and bottle.
 



Basically what I'm trying to say is:

There are a lot of people dying because they don't have clean water, and the proper hygiene that comes with it. We in the developed world are stupid enough to pay (a lot) for the water that should be freely ours, and everyone elses. Not to mention, we use zillions of chemicals and toxins to produce, package, haul, and house our bottled water, which we then throw away and create more of a problem.

Think about:
Getting a water filter
Not buying bottled water
Using BPA free products
Being aware of who is "using" your natural water resources for profit in your community
Daily household water consumption (showers, dishes,dishwasher, etc.)

We CAN truly each make a difference as cheesy as it always sounds.
 






This is another one called Tapped

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