What are the impacts of climate change on water quality and quantity?

Question

What are the impacts of climate change on water quality and quantity?

Answer 1

When it comes to fresh water supplies, the key word is going to be availability.  That is, some places will experience wide spread drought, while others will be inundated with flood.  

However where climate change is have a currently noticeable effect on water is with our oceans.  The latest sign that we are in big trouble is the sudden explosion (population growth) of jellyfish.  Their numbers are exceeding pre-human evolutionary times, resembling the oceans of ancient seas, before even plants were located on land.

Tomahawk is right as well.

To the guy who thinks money will fix it all, If you destroy the earths ability to clean and renew its fresh water source, it doesn't mater how rich you are unless your d**k Cheney holed up in your Bunker 40 feet under D.C.

Answer 2

So-called "global warming" has absolutely no effect on water quality or quantity.

Answer 3

Water quality is a strictly local problem and has gone down hill in those regions that turned their responsibility over to state or federal agencies. For a worst case scenario on the temperature upside all we need to do is look at the mid 1930s when the worlds average climate was several degrees warmer than it has reached in this cycle. For a worst case scenario on the downside we can look at the 1800 period at the worst of the little ice age and can see what happened then.

I for one am still waiting to be shown valid evidence as to why so many people are running around like a bunch of ants in a rainstorm. Why worry this happens every 50 to 60 years at this level and every 600 to a thousand it gets a little warmer or a little colder than now. Actually we are in a very mild intermediate period and it is normally either a lot colder than present or a great deal hotter than it is now. Be thankful we are having it so good as during the 1930s it got a great deal hotter than it has during the current upswing and we could be heading into a cooler period like the early 50s and the 70s were.

Answer 4

It will have an impact to the sea water.

As you know when the ice in the North Pole melts,it add more fresh water into the sea.For your information,salt is important to the sea as the hot current of water flow near the North Pole,it condense because of the salt+lower temperature and this will cause a cycle through out the entire world(ocean)and it will cause a lot more trouble to the ecosystem since some of them depend on it to travel/migrate and the temperature of the hot current increasing the number of plankton.If this current stops,it will lead to more and more problem to our Earth.

I;m not so sure about the trouble that will cause.If you have sometime,watch 'The Inconvenient Truth' on youtube.

Answer 5

There will be no change in the amount of water on the planet but where it is located, and whether it is useful for human purposes (e.g. 'quality') is another matter.

Most of the world's fresh water is currently locked in ice; this will change. As Tomahawk points out, changing salinity patterns in the oceans (where most of this fresh water will go) will change ecosystems, weather patterns and heat transfer mechanisms. Exactly what the impact of this will be is unknown at present as the variables are too many.

A lot more water than present will be in the atmosphere; this will not only add to global warming (water vapour being a greenhouse gas) but quite possibly contribute to bigger storms and generally more humid conditions.

Rising sea levels will also make much of the water currently in use - namely ground water in low lying areas - too saline for drinking or agriculture.

Shrinking glaciers will also decrease flows in rivers and cause areas fed by glaciers to become much drier. The Ganges, Yellow, Indus and other Himalayan rivers are particularly worrying.

The biggest impact of CC on water however is change - we cannot predict exactly but we can say - by definition - that precipitation patterns will change; some places will get wetter (maybe too wet as in flooding very frequently) and some will get drier (maybe too dry as in drought or desertification e.g. Australia).

Answer 6

The total amount of water on the planet is fixed... it's not going anywhere. Climate change has no effect on this.

Drinking water quality is directly related to national prosperity and not climate change. I'm sure you have no reason for concern.