The World’s Essential Aquifers Are in Deep Trouble

The water that pours out of your tap, or that’s unnecessarily packaged in a single-use bottle, or that helped grow the produce in your fridge—all of it may well have come from aquifers somewhere. These are layers of underground material that hold water, and can be made up of porous rock or sediments like sand and gravel. When it rains, some water collects in lakes and rivers and eventually flows out to sea, but some soaks deep into the ground, accumulating in these subterranean stores.

We dig shallow wells or drill deeper boreholes to tap into aquifers to hydrate our civilization, but that extraction has gotten way out of hand.

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