Climate Change

By Maanya Lakhiani

How Climate Change Impacts Our Water

Climate change impacts the world’s water in complex ways. These changes will put pressure on drinking water supplies, food production, property values, and more, in the U.S. and all around the world.

Evaporation

• Warmer air can hold more moisture than cool air.
• As a result, in a warmer world, the air will suck up more water from oceans, lakes, soil and plants.
• The drier conditions this air leaves behind could negatively affect drinking water supplies and agriculture.

Precipitation

• When all that extra warm, extra wet air cools down, it drops extra rain or snow to the ground.
• Thus, a warmer world means we get hit with heavier rain and snowstorms.
• The heavier bursts of precipitation caused by warmer, wetter air can lead to flooding, which can endanger human lives, damage homes, kill crops, and hurt the economy.

What Can Be Done? It is important to learn more about how climate change is going to affect the water in your own region, and start taking action locally!