Iowa State University Fresh Water Essay

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“97.5% of all water on Earth is salt water, leaving only 2.5% as fresh water” (Human Appropriation of the World's Fresh Water Supply). With only 2.5% of earth’s total water harmonious enough to use, we have to administrate it correctly. Iowa State University and the students are in the pursuit of discovering the best way’s to distribute the water in farming, improving quality of water, and the systems used to manage it. One of the representatives of the Iowa Water Center said, “We facilitate research related to water management and disseminate information to those in the water profession.”(Citation). This relates to everyone, because as humans we utilize water everyday. From a routinely shower, to our daily meal. In order to understand how …show more content…

The Water Center was implemented in 1964 by an act of US Congress. And now one of those investigations involves improving the land for farming. This land can be improved by having strips of native grass in between and near the creeks. The native grass is implemented to slow down the flow of phosphorous and nitrogen that moves in the soil than into the rivers. The nitrogen and the phosphorous are good for the plants and crops because it’s a huge source of nutrients. But when these elements get to the creeks and streams, then we have a problem. The problem develops from the fact that in order to have clean, crystal clear water, we must have a clean source from where to gather it. And when phosphorous and nitrogen reach the water sources, they start to develop plant life on the surface of it. This is called eutrophication, which essentially is the growth of algae blooms. “As a result of eutrophication, a pond or lake slowly evolves into a marsh or swamp, then into a bog, and finally into a meadow.” (Water Quality Information) When we loose these few creeks and streams due to eutrophication, it’s difficult and expensive to recover them. Loosing a water source is unacceptable; especially now when the human population increases at an exponential

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