Today, in a society full of advanced technology, people think our country is perfect. With water resistant phones, 3-D holographic advancements, and cars equipped with automatic braking systems, it is no wonder Americans have this perceived idea of perfection. However, our country is suffering from a problem that we thought only third world countries suffered from, and our carelessness about this issue is not helping our increasingly dangerous situation. Water is everything; water is everywhere. It covers about 70% of all of Earth’s surface, so it is undeniably one of our greatest natural resources. Therefore, it would be logical for us to protect it more than anything else; however, we rarely take good care of it and this problem is becoming
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According to EWG.com, the top two most polluted rivers in the U.S. are the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. These two rivers together contain over 45,000,000 pounds of toxic discharges and supply water to at least 13 states. But these states are not the only ones suffering from these toxic tides. Sara Jerome revealed in her Water Online article on July 11, 2014 the top ten states with the worst contaminated drinking water: Indiana, Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Virginia, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, and Ohio. Additionally, she reported that “The Great Lakes were among the hardest hit, swallowing 8.39 million pounds of toxic chemicals in 2012 alone”. These statistics are frightening and should be known by the general public so people can take action against contamination. Conserve Energy Future lists 14 different causes of water pollution including industrial waste and marine dumping, oil leakages, fossil fuel burning, fertilizers, pesticides, and outdated and unkept water distribution systems. This example is a major one because the majority of our nation’s water is treated in plants or in private filtration systems, but as the water travels through these obsolete pipes, rust and other pollutants enter the water supply which in turn pollutes the water. However, the main cause of contamination is human related. Because we are so unaware of how poor our water is, we unknowingly make matters worse. We are the source of the contamination chaos. We are the ones who dump the waste. We are the ones spreading fertilizers and pesticides. We are the ones not responsible enough to take good care of and update our distribution systems. We are the ones participating in marine dumping, we cause oil leaks, and we burn fossil fuels. We should be the ones fixing this problem, not
According to EWG.com, the top two most polluted rivers in the U.S. are the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. These two rivers together contain over 45,000,000 pounds of toxic discharges and supply water to at least 13 states. But these states are not the only ones suffering from these toxic tides. Sara Jerome revealed in her Water Online article on July 11, 2014 the top ten states with the worst contaminated drinking water: Indiana, Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Virginia, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, and Ohio. Additionally, she reported that “The Great Lakes were among the hardest hit, swallowing 8.39 million pounds of toxic chemicals in 2012 alone”. These statistics are frightening and should be known by the general public so people can take action against contamination. Conserve Energy Future lists 14 different causes of water pollution including industrial waste and marine dumping, oil leakages, fossil fuel burning, fertilizers, pesticides, and outdated and unkept water distribution systems. This example is a major one because the majority of our nation’s water is treated in plants or in private filtration systems, but as the water travels through these obsolete pipes, rust and other pollutants enter the water supply which in turn pollutes the water. However, the main cause of contamination is human related. Because we are so unaware of how poor our water is, we unknowingly make matters worse. We are the source of the contamination chaos. We are the ones who dump the waste. We are the ones spreading fertilizers and pesticides. We are the ones not responsible enough to take good care of and update our distribution systems. We are the ones participating in marine dumping, we cause oil leaks, and we burn fossil fuels. We should be the ones fixing this problem, not