Ground Water: Use it, but Lose it
by John Landy
Suburbia is truly a wonderful place to be, completely dissociated from the corruptions of urban society. Just look at the air—if you could, that is. You won’t find smog here, not in the suburbs. No more worrying about lung irritation; you can breathe easy. It seems that cities are not the ideal place to live, especially if you care about the health of the environment, or your own health. There is hardly any greenery to be seen, unlike in suburbia, with its green lawns—greener than any green city dwellers have ever seen.
In fact, it seems that lawns really are the defining factor of the suburbs. There is simply nothing more appealing than seeing a lush, well-watered lawn. They seem to represent harmony between all living things. They seem to represent the possibility of a natural environment, observed yet untouched by humanity. They seem to represent the undoing of the calamity and tragedy brought about by humans onto the environment.
But in reality, lawns—and suburbia—represent the systematic devastation of underground reservoirs of water.
The domestic water supply is unique from other uses of water in the United States in that the vast majority (roughly 98%) comes from groundwater. And that’s fine because groundwater is a useful source of freshwater and should be used to supply households nationwide. So one must think that groundwater is—like all water—a renewable resource, so we can use it and it will come back to us. This is true.
Well, it’s true to some extent. Groundwater is a renewable resource; it is constantly being recharged, mostly by rain. Since soil is porous, water can seep into the ground and then reach the water table—the top of the layer of water in the ground. This is where it stays, usually.
Despite recharging, using groundwater too quickly can result in its depletion. Depletion of groundwater causes the water table to lower, which leads to loss of riparian—the zone between terrestrial habitat and water habitat—vegetation and consequently some of the ecosystem’s fauna. Groundwater depletion can also lead to saltwater getting into our fresh groundwater, so our freshwater supply gets contaminated. This is bad, unless you like drinking salt water and dying of dehydration, because that’s what’s going to happen and it’s all your fault—congratulations, you deserve it.
But you’re not dead yet. You’re far from it, in fact. You’re enjoying your suburban life, taking twenty minute showers and watering your spectacle of a lawn; it’s much better than your neighbor’s, might I add—very green, the envy of the neighborhood. No, you’re not dead; you’re thriving. You have room to breathe; you have room to make changes. And there’s even better news: you have time to make changes. The apocalypse might seem inevitable, and it is, but we can change it from a human-caused apocalypse to the completely inescapable heat death of the universe. To do this, you might need to actually make an effort, but not too much of an effort because you can just buy appliances that use less water or more efficient showerheads and faucets. Some things actually take negative effort, like not washing particular articles of clothing if you wore it for only a brief period of time. And that may sound disgusting, but what’s even more disgusting is standing idly by while the earth deteriorates under your feet.
[Photo, Groundwater Well, by Kecko licensed by CC BY 2.0]
by John Landy
Suburbia is truly a wonderful place to be, completely dissociated from the corruptions of urban society. Just look at the air—if you could, that is. You won’t find smog here, not in the suburbs. No more worrying about lung irritation; you can breathe easy. It seems that cities are not the ideal place to live, especially if you care about the health of the environment, or your own health. There is hardly any greenery to be seen, unlike in suburbia, with its green lawns—greener than any green city dwellers have ever seen.
In fact, it seems that lawns really are the defining factor of the suburbs. There is simply nothing more appealing than seeing a lush, well-watered lawn. They seem to represent harmony between all living things. They seem to represent the possibility of a natural environment, observed yet untouched by humanity. They seem to represent the undoing of the calamity and tragedy brought about by humans onto the environment.
But in reality, lawns—and suburbia—represent the systematic devastation of underground reservoirs of water.
The domestic water supply is unique from other uses of water in the United States in that the vast majority (roughly 98%) comes from groundwater. And that’s fine because groundwater is a useful source of freshwater and should be used to supply households nationwide. So one must think that groundwater is—like all water—a renewable resource, so we can use it and it will come back to us. This is true.
Well, it’s true to some extent. Groundwater is a renewable resource; it is constantly being recharged, mostly by rain. Since soil is porous, water can seep into the ground and then reach the water table—the top of the layer of water in the ground. This is where it stays, usually.
Despite recharging, using groundwater too quickly can result in its depletion. Depletion of groundwater causes the water table to lower, which leads to loss of riparian—the zone between terrestrial habitat and water habitat—vegetation and consequently some of the ecosystem’s fauna. Groundwater depletion can also lead to saltwater getting into our fresh groundwater, so our freshwater supply gets contaminated. This is bad, unless you like drinking salt water and dying of dehydration, because that’s what’s going to happen and it’s all your fault—congratulations, you deserve it.
But you’re not dead yet. You’re far from it, in fact. You’re enjoying your suburban life, taking twenty minute showers and watering your spectacle of a lawn; it’s much better than your neighbor’s, might I add—very green, the envy of the neighborhood. No, you’re not dead; you’re thriving. You have room to breathe; you have room to make changes. And there’s even better news: you have time to make changes. The apocalypse might seem inevitable, and it is, but we can change it from a human-caused apocalypse to the completely inescapable heat death of the universe. To do this, you might need to actually make an effort, but not too much of an effort because you can just buy appliances that use less water or more efficient showerheads and faucets. Some things actually take negative effort, like not washing particular articles of clothing if you wore it for only a brief period of time. And that may sound disgusting, but what’s even more disgusting is standing idly by while the earth deteriorates under your feet.
[Photo, Groundwater Well, by Kecko licensed by CC BY 2.0]