Essay On The Water Cycle

733 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Effect of water cycle

The world’s total water supply is approximately 332.5 million cubic miles of water, which covers up about 70% of earth’s surface. With that much water inhabiting our planet, there obviously has to be a way to keep the water moving. We call this the water cycle, which has been around longer than we can know. The great thing about the water cycle is that it can never stop working because water will always be evaporated. In fact, we are now using the same water as we did during Earth’s beginning, thanks to the water cycle. Growing up, we all learned about the water cycle and its three simple stages. Those stages were evaporation, condensation, and precipitation. Come to find out there is a lot more that goes into the cycle than we first learned.
Deposition occurs when a vapor is directly turned into a solid. Deposition is most frequently seen in frost or snowflakes. Although this process is relevant to the water cycle, it is not one that we experience as frequently as some of the other processes and is certainly not as distinct. The third step in the water cycle is precipitation. After the molecule has been turned back into a liquid, something must happen. That “something” is precipitation. According to an article from usgs.gov, in 2015, Precipitation is water released from clouds in the form of rain, freezing rain, sleet, snow, or hail. This is the part in the water cycle that connects water from the atmosphere to earth. The most frequent type of precipitation that we experience is rain. Infiltration is another minor process in the water cycle. Infiltration is the process of water soaking into the ground and moving about the area into rocks and pore spaces. When water lands on shallow soil, it will move horizontally and vertically through. If the ground is deeper, the water could begin to recharge the groundwater aquifers. If this were to happen, people could make a hole in the ground and begin using it as a water source. There are many factors that impact infiltration such as precipitation intensity, soil characteristics, slope of the ground, and more. The ground can only soak up so much water at one time. The excess water is considered runoff water, which is surface water that runs off the

Show More
Related

  • Hydrologic cycle of the Panamanian rainforest and Mojave desert

    592 Words  | 2 Pages

    Water has three stages—liquid, gas and solid. Water on Earth can be liquid as rain, streams, or oceans. It can be a solid like hail, ice or snow. It can be a gas like vapor, steam or clouds. As described by the Department of Atmospheric Sciences (2010), the hydrologic cycle is the process of water changing from liquid to gas to solid. The energy of the sun drives the changes to water. When water is heated up, it evaporates, turning into a gas to form steam or vapor. The water vapor rises with warm air that when meets cooler air, condenses to form clouds. These clouds and water vapor can be transported around the world. Precipitation is when water falls to Earth, in warmer temperatures as liquid and in temperatures, as a solid. On Earth, precipitation can evaporate again or infiltrate the Earth to become groundwater. As ground water it can collect in oceans, rivers or on snowy mountaintops and glaciers. It can also be released back into the atmosphere via transpiration, when water evaporates off soil, trees. When water evaporates, the cycle starts again.

    Read More

  • The Water Supply of Florida

    1582 Words  | 4 Pages

    There are numerous stages that take place simultaneously in the hydrologic cycle and this includes evaporation. This is when the water alters from a liquid state into a gas. The damp air from the water rises into the atmosphere and when it cools, the vapor condenses and shapes into clouds. But those billows are not the only form the vapors make; it can also materialize as dew, fog and mist, which blanket the Earth, characteristically on a rainy or humid day. Evaporation takes place when water changes from a liquid state into a gaseous state, and ascents out of the pores of the earth and into the atmosphere as a vapor (“How”). While evaporation is taking place, condensation is also occurring. When the temperature in the air plunges, the clouds become heavy and as a result they relieve themselves of the extra weight, which is called precipitation. This produces rain, hail, snow and sleet, conditioned upon the temperate. As the precipitation falls, it enters the surface of the ground and percolates into the soil, which is called infiltration. The more porous the land is, the more the infiltration can take place. However, the ground cannot hold all of that water and floods. The excess rainfall, which is also called runoff that has not been absorbed makes its way into bodies of water, such as small ponds, rivers, lakes and parts of the ocean (“Summary”).

    Read More

  • Storm Water Ponds Essay

    1296 Words  | 3 Pages

    The way storm water ponds work, they collect runoff, of course, it then slows the water. This is done so that it will hold long enough to allow gravity to pull out sediments from the water and allows sunlight and biochemical systems

    Read More

  • The Hydrologic Cycle and Desert Landscape

    689 Words  | 2 Pages

    The hydrologic cycle is how water moves through the natural process of evaporation, condensing as clouds and then falling back to the earth as rain, sleet, snow or fog. The Hydologic Cycle as defined by Lutgens F. and Tarbuck E. (2013), “The unending circulation of Earth’s water supply. The cycle is powered by energy from the sun and is characterized by continuous exchanges of water among the oceans, the atmosphere, the geosphere and the biosphere.” In Napa California the hydrologic cycle is when water enters the system as rainfall and leaves the system as either runoff to the San Francisco Bay or evaporates back into the cycle.

    Read More

  • Rain Water Runoff Research Paper

    335 Words  | 1 Pages

    Runoff water has many sources and flows into many sources. There are multiple reasons we have runoff. Runoff takes place when there is a lot of water that the land can't handle.

    Read More

  • Solving the Water Problems in America

    1648 Words  | 4 Pages

    “Water is the driving force of all nature.” Leonardo da Vince once said. Water is a huge part of life, and everything that lives requires water to make it through its days on earth. A lot of people think that the world has massive amounts of water available for use; therefore, most roll their eyes when conserving water is mentioned. After all, 71% of the earth’s surface is made up of water. However, the truth is that only 2.5% of that is clean, drinkable water, and two-thirds of that percentage is unavailable because it is stuck in ice caps and glaciers (water). The water ordeal in America is bigger than many realize, and the United States needs to begin looking at how we can solve this issue. The U.S. needs to acknowledge the impending dangers and help the states that are already suffering by putting water conservation methods in place and investing money into research for alternatives.

    Read More

  • The Water Droplet's Journey

    1076 Words  | 3 Pages

    Once upon a time high above the earth, fluffy white clouds drifted through the atmosphere. In the clouds lived a family Droplet of water, round and content with life. For as long as I could remember, I spent my days lying on my back, relaxing and soaking up the sun's warm rays. One day, I took my usual place in the sun but the light didn't seem to be as bright. In fact, as the day went on, it grew darker and darker, loud claps of thunder shook the cloud, and the Droplet felt as if he were getting so heavy he could hardly move. This is called precipitation.

    Read More

  • Acid Rain Essay

    519 Words  | 2 Pages

    Acid rain comes in wet deposition or dry deposition. Wet deposition is any form of precipitation that removes acids from the atmosphere and deposits them on the Earth’s...

    Read More

  • Acid Rain Essay

    728 Words  | 2 Pages

    Rain forms when water vapor condenses and falls, the more it condenses the more it falls. Some raindrops are not pure and are filled with other materials, this is known as acid rain. Acid rain is a huge problem all over the world. Acid rain is mixture of chemicals, like fossil fuels and the atmosphere, it then comes down as rain, snow, hail, and sleet. The burning of fossil fuels is the main cause of acid rain. When oil and coal are burned they create sulfur dioxide, nitric oxide, and nitrogen dioxide. (" Acid Rain | US EPA") The mixture of all the chemicals and heavy winds blow the compounds across many borders.

    Read More

  • The Global Water Crisis

    2639 Words  | 6 Pages

    Freshwater in the world makes up only a small portion of the water on the planet. While the percentage of water in the world is nearly 70%, only 2.5% is consumable. Even further, only 1% is easily accessible to basic human needs. According to National Geographic, “by 2025, an estimated 1.8 billion people will live in areas plagued by water scarcity, with two-thirds of the world's population living in water-stressed regions as a result of use, growth, and climate change.” With this current trend, water will become more immersed in environmental, economic, political, and social changes.

    Read More

  • Waste Water Essay

    1958 Words  | 4 Pages

    Wastewater can be a fancy term used for the water that has been adversely affected by human activity like dishwashing, fertilizing crops, bathing and flushing the toilet.

    Read More

  • Causes, Effects and Solution of Water Polution

    1069 Words  | 3 Pages

    Water is on of the most precious natural resources that exist on our planet. “It is delivered from the atmosphere in the form of rain, snow, hail, fog, and condensation and returns to the atmosphere by evaporation and transpiration” (Hannigan 1969). Although many of us love activities that have to do with water, we disregard it and pollute out rivers, lakes and oceans. Slowly but surely we are going to harm out planet till no return. Protecting and conserving nature will secure a better future. 71% of earth is covered with oceans. Sounds like a lot right? Imagine ...

    Read More

  • Weather And Weather: Different Types Of Weather

    939 Words  | 2 Pages

    There’s four different types of precipitation rain, snow, sleet, and hail. Rain is caused when the molecules in the air that are filled with moisture and start to get to where the could can’t carry it so it precipitates. Snow is kind of the same except when this happens it depends on the temperature of that layer of the atmosphere if it’s

    Read More

  • We Must Prevent Water Pollution

    712 Words  | 2 Pages

    Water is our main source of our life. We need it to live, drink, bathe,

    Read More

  • Water Scarcity and Possible Solutions

    1100 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Water is the lifeblood of this planet. Every time a good is bought or sold there is a virtual exchange of water. Every time we interact with water, we change it, redirect it, or otherwise alter its state. We have never learned how to efficiently manage water.”(Cluckie, 2009) Ian Cluckie, Professor of Hydrology and Water Management, emphasizes the fact that humans can’t survive without water. Although water is a renewable resource that can replenish under hydrological cycles, our intervention has interrupted its natural cycle causing its supply to decrease.(Cluckie, 2009)

    Read More

More about Essay On The Water Cycle

Open Document