You may be familiar with the idea of carbon footprint - the amount of greenhouse gases produced by human activity. How about water footprint? Now scientists have begun calculating a water footprint - the amount of water needed to produce goods or services.
The ever growing water footprint has raised concerns on the scarcity of water resources. Nearly half the people on Earth, about 2.5 billion, have no access to sanitation, many of them in urban slums. The world's cities are growing by 1 million people a week, and soon their aging water systems will not cope.
A report published this month by UNESCO-IHE, the Institute for Water Education in Delft, says it takes 70-400 times as much water to create energy from biofuels as it does from fossil fuels.It said the production of crude oil requires slightly more than one cubic meter of water for one unit of energy, compared with 61 cubic meters to grow biomass in Brazil -- mostly sugar used for ethanol -- for the same amount of energy. The water footprint of biomass grown in the Netherlands is 24 cubic meters, the report said.
According to a U.S. Environmental Agency, biofuel is considered by some as a means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing energy security by providing an alternative to fossil fuels. However, the report of UNESCO-IHE may suggest that this alternative may create problems on water security.
How could we link water security to global citizenship? All our acts in Hong Kong/ Cambodia/ every part in the world are affecting the environment. From a market perspective, the production of energy (i.e. supply of energy) is dependent on our demand on goods and services. If we consume less energy, less energy would be produced and thus less water would be used for producing biofuel.
From an environmental perspective, a decrease of consumption of water does not only improve water security, but also improves the problem of climate change. Oh, wait! Global warming has made the ice melting, so we would have more water then? Some regions are threatening by rising sea level! Yes, indeed, this statement is half right and half wrong. This is because, on the other hand, global warming has increased the temperature and inland regions would not be "benefited" from rising sea level. Instead, people there would be threatened by droughts and thus suffered from water scarcity.
We have briefly talked about human security in previuos entry. Water security is a major area which human security advocates concern on. So, what can we do? How about changing our consumption behaviour in order to decrease both carbon footprint and water footprint?
The ever growing water footprint has raised concerns on the scarcity of water resources. Nearly half the people on Earth, about 2.5 billion, have no access to sanitation, many of them in urban slums. The world's cities are growing by 1 million people a week, and soon their aging water systems will not cope.
A report published this month by UNESCO-IHE, the Institute for Water Education in Delft, says it takes 70-400 times as much water to create energy from biofuels as it does from fossil fuels.It said the production of crude oil requires slightly more than one cubic meter of water for one unit of energy, compared with 61 cubic meters to grow biomass in Brazil -- mostly sugar used for ethanol -- for the same amount of energy. The water footprint of biomass grown in the Netherlands is 24 cubic meters, the report said.
According to a U.S. Environmental Agency, biofuel is considered by some as a means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing energy security by providing an alternative to fossil fuels. However, the report of UNESCO-IHE may suggest that this alternative may create problems on water security.
How could we link water security to global citizenship? All our acts in Hong Kong/ Cambodia/ every part in the world are affecting the environment. From a market perspective, the production of energy (i.e. supply of energy) is dependent on our demand on goods and services. If we consume less energy, less energy would be produced and thus less water would be used for producing biofuel.
From an environmental perspective, a decrease of consumption of water does not only improve water security, but also improves the problem of climate change. Oh, wait! Global warming has made the ice melting, so we would have more water then? Some regions are threatening by rising sea level! Yes, indeed, this statement is half right and half wrong. This is because, on the other hand, global warming has increased the temperature and inland regions would not be "benefited" from rising sea level. Instead, people there would be threatened by droughts and thus suffered from water scarcity.
We have briefly talked about human security in previuos entry. Water security is a major area which human security advocates concern on. So, what can we do? How about changing our consumption behaviour in order to decrease both carbon footprint and water footprint?
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