Continuing our discussion on water and how it is currently used in the economic system. We explore the myth of Canada’s limitless water supplies and also how much is used in agriculture and mining.
Why worry about water? It’s infinite!
Living in Toronto, Canada or other major cities, we often think we're fine when it comes to water. For example, former Canadian Primer Minister Jean Chretien said:
“We’re selling oil. It’s finite. We’re selling natural gas. It’s finite. Water, it’s raining and snowing in Canada every year...Water is something that is not finite.”
We simply turn on the tap and there it is. Take a shower, drink as much you like, and we're okay. The other idea that perpetuates this idea is the water cycle will "automagically" clean-up any issues with the water and make it right as rain.
The other thing we have heard, specifically within Canada, is that the country has abundant freshwater. For example, the right-wing think tank Fraser Institute states:
“Canada is richly endowed with non-renewable and renewable freshwater resources. With 563 large lakes across the country, Canada has more lakes than any other country in the world, giving us an impressive non-renewable water supply. The Great Lakes, which are shared between Canada and the United States, are the largest group of freshwater lakes in the world and account for 18 per cent of the global stock of fresh surface water.”
How much freshwater does Canada actually have?
Although Canada has 20% of the world's freshwater supply, 90% of Canadians can't readily access that. More specifically:
“Canada’s total annual renewable freshwater supply … is about 3,472 cubic kilometres, roughly the equivalent to the volume of Lake Huron. This represents about 6.5% of the world’s renewable water. But 60% of that flows northward in mighty rivers, leaving about 2.6% of the world’s total to the 90% of Canadians who live along the Canada-U.S. border.” (Reference)
Groundwater versus other Freshwater
The water cycle that we are taught as kids doesn’t, in a sense, apply to groundwater. A 2015 Study out of the University of Victoria, found “that less than six per cent of groundwater globally is renewable on this human lifespan timescale, so over 50 years". What's more, is that "over a third of humans drink groundwater every day, and we use it for irrigated agriculture around the world. It's a hugely important, critical resource for both drinking water and for growing food”.
If it’s so renewable, why are water levels dropping?
As highlighted in Boiling Point, water is in decline. Canada's net water loss - between 1971 and 2004 - was about 3.5 trillion litres per year. How much is 3.5 trillion litres? About the annual water consumption of Canada.
Virtual Water & Agriculture
In the last installment, we looked at Coke, clothing and consumer electronics – all significant users of water. However, the largest industrial use of water is agriculture. According to the World Bank, 70% of fresh water is used for agriculture. According to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, it takes anywhere between 5,000 and 20,000 litres of water to produce a kilogram of meat. In California, who experienced a “prolonged drought that dried California's forests and grasslands into a tinderbox," uses 90% of its water for agriculture.
Philip Lymbery, who creates awareness about the risks with factory farming, noted that “Feeding animals on grass can hugely reduce the toll on rivers and underground water sources. Rearing them on factory farms where they are grain-fed is over forty times more water-intensive.”
Maude Barlow argues that although Canada uses only 8% of its water for agriculture, 70% of that is virtual water that gets exported out of the country. What is virtual water? It’s the water that’s hidden in the production of the good or service. For example, 56L out of the 70L of water used to produce a bottle of pop belongs to the sugar contained in the toxic drink.
Mining:
Annually, the global mining industry uses between 6 trillion to 9 trillion litres of water. Interestingly, the situation is so precarious that the mining executives have to admit that “[w]ater is one of the greatest constraints to new supply of mined products across the industry." The same article also notes, since 2000, "water-related issues were implicated in 58 percent of mining cases lodged with the World Bank Group's Compliance Officer Ombudsman”.
For specific impacts, we can look at how mining is affecting the Canadian waterways (reference):
From the Athabascan River, 170 billion litres of freshwater is withdrawn annually by the tar sands industry.
In 2013, Alberta extracted 17 billion litres for fracking
In 2012, British Columbia, extracted 7 billion litres of water was extracted in 2012 for the purposes of fracking. Based on current projections on the number of gas wells to be built that number is expected to rise 500%.
What does fracking have to do with water?
As noted in the explainer video, the gas can leak out into the underlying water table. The result? See for the following clip from the movie Gasland by Josh Fox.
Water vs #firstworldproblems
In future posts, we will look deeper at the issue of pollution and how it impacts African Americans and Native Canadians.
But before we discuss that, I wanted to look at how the Capitalist mindset has distorted our perspective of value on things by saturating our mind with the love of things. Consumerism is no small problem that infects us all. Whether it's Boxing Day sales or Black Friday, we are all being seduced into being slaves to materialism. Why bring this problem up when discussing water? It goes to how we look at things. Imagine, instead of advertising the next smartphone, car, or whatever, that we were reminded about how fortunate we are to have the blessing of clean water?
Prophet Muhammad (saw) taught us that:
“Look at those who are beneath you and do not look at those who are above you, for it is more suitable that you should not consider as less the blessing of Allah.” [ibn Majah]
Since advertising won't do that, we need to remind everyone, including ourselves about the massive gift we have – just by having access to water. By reflecting on what blessing water is in our lives, we can effectively drown out the constant barrage of messages telling us to "shop till we drop." Shopping is all about anticipation – that’s where the dopamine-high comes from. But to get the anticipation, we must first be seduced into being miserable about our current state of being. The fact we have water is something that can help us push back against the consumerist onslaught. We can emancipate our minds from these toxic messages from the media by recognizing the immense luxury water is. By Allah's (swt) permission, we can get beyond the commercials and not only be content with what we have, but recognize what an immense luxury the basics of life actually are.
In sha Allah, in the next post, we will explore the problem of pollution.