One topic when talking about protecting the environment is that a lot of water is used in, for example meat. But isn’t water in a cycle within a closed system? I drink it / but it into plants or animals and after I consume it, the water gets released again.
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True, it’s not the water itself that’s the concern. It’s the source it comes from that saving water is trying to protect. Underground aquifers have already been commented on, but even taking from surface sources impact the lakes and rivers it came from. It’s an extreme example, but we take so much water out of the Colorado river that [it’s just a trickle by the time it reaches the sea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_River_Delta). This has effectively destroyed a major spawning location for all sorts of animals in the Gulf of Mexico.
It takes considerable energy to maintain water pressure and move water. The majority of energy is non-renewable.
The water you use will generally end up in a river, then the sea. It will evaporate and return as rain. Today’s rain-pattern may result in the rain being where it’s not helpful and missing where it would be needed by plants and animals alike.
*However*, the water you use is often not rain-water (treates surface-water from a lake or a stream) but ground-water, water from deep down that filtered through the earth in a process taking decades or centuries. Groundwater is often depleted much, much faster than it’s replenished.
You see the problem by now, I guess.
Also, pumping water for use lowers the level of (closer to surface) ground water, making it harder or even impossible for plants (like deep-rooting trees) to reach it.
Finally, pumping, treating and possibly heating water costs energy.
Also: “saving” or “conserving” water is like “saving” or “conserving” electricity. The more demand there is, the more generating and processing facilities are required. By limiting usage (demand) less production and waste processing is needed, both of which can be a NIMBY problem.
I think the issue is processed water that is used outside the “natural” water cycle in places it would not ordinarily be, and then put into nature where it would not ordinarily go.
Because though water does come back in general via the water cycle it doesn’t come back evenly everywhere there are some places which get less rain than they use in water, in this case they use underground water sources called aquifers. Aquifers are underground stores of water in permeable rock. These stores of water can be used for farming or drinking, but can become depleted or result in salt contamination, causing serious issues for populations that are relying upon the aquifers. – https://youtu.be/xbUfVLxYVcE
Drinking more water doesn’t make it rain more.
The water cycle is closed globally, but locally it is not. When the water you use returns to the environment, it flows downstream and is no longer available to you. You are ultimately dependant on rain for your water, which is completely independent from how much you use.
Even in a fully closed cycle, there is a limited amount of water available at any given time, and also only some water is in the stage of the cycle where we can use it.
Suppose that me and my tribe live under a glass dome with a closed water cycle. There is a total of 1000 liters of water in this dome at any given time. Any water that I use, whether it is to cook food, wash clothes, drink, or water my crops, will still be part of the cycle. However, while I’m using a given liter of water, my fellow tribespeople cannot use that same liter. If it’s in my cooking pot, it cannot also water my neighbor’s plants. Once I’m done with it, I may give it to my neighbor. Or, I may discard it and it will find its way back to the lake from which we both get our water, and then he can use it.
So, while no water ever gets used up (not permanently anyway), it’s still important how much water is in use at any given time. If our tribe’s water use gets out of hand, our demand might go beyond the 1000 liters that are in our dome. Now maybe I want to drink some water, but I can’t, because every liter of water is being used elsewhere. The fact that this water will eventually be freed up again is no good to me right now.
Also, even if we only use, say, 800 liters of water at any given time, the question is where the remaining water hangs out. If it’s in the lake, that’s fine because we can go there and collect it. But if it’s in the air, in clouds or water vapor, then we need to wait for it to rain. If it’s in the ground, we also may not be able to get to it. So, even if there is enough water under our dome in total, there may not be enough that’s actually available at any given time.
One important way in practice that water in the water cycle becomes unavailable is when it ends up in the ocean. While it is in there, we have practically no access to it, unless we expend a lot of energy to remove the salt from the water that we want to use. So in practice, we have to wait for the salt water to evaporate and rain down as fresh water again.
So yeah, in short, it’s all about how much water is available at any given time. The fact that water is in a closed cycle is no good to me if I need to wait too long for water to become available again, or other people always get to it before I can.
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