Source: French People Are Fighting Over Giant Pools of Water – The Atlantic
Climate change will leave many regions alternating between harsh multiyear droughts and sudden, extreme flooding—all as the water frozen in Earth’s poles, glaciers, and permafrost melts away. Groundwater might seem to be a limitless resource of moisture in the unpredictable and imbalanced future. But it’s not, and scientists say that the fresh water lying beneath our feet should be managed like any other nonrenewable resource.
“They’re thinking very short-term,” Amblard said of mega-basin proponents. “Water needs to stay in the ground.”
Surface water is all the water we can observe: ponds, streams, rivers, lakes, seas, and oceans. It coats almost three-quarters of the planet. When we imagine water, we usually envision surface water.
Our stores of groundwater, on the other hand, are invisible and vast. Most of this water is stored in the gaps between rocks, sediment, and sand—think of it like the moisture in a sopping wet sponge. Some groundwater is relatively young, but some represents the remains of rain that fell thousands of years ago. Overall, groundwater accounts for 98 percent of Earth’s unfrozen fresh water. It provides one-third of global drinking water and nearly half of the planet’s agricultural irrigation.
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