Water in the nature

Water is essential for life and the life started in water. A human body consists of ca. 70% water.  If 20% water in a body is lost, a man dies. A man survives for not more than 7-10 day without water. Plants contain as much as 90% water.

Water covers 71% of the Earth’s surface. More than 97% of water surface is covered by seas and oceans, while 3% only are covered by freshwater. 69% of freshwater is in glaciers in the North Pole and South Pole. 30% is groundwater and only one percent is surface water and atmospheric water. Besides the seawater and freshwater, there is brackish water which results from mixing of seawater with fresh water.

The water cycle in the nature starts with rainfall. More than 50% rainfall evaporates (sometimes as much as 100%), 10-20% flows into streams and rivers and, in turn, seas and oceans, and only as little as 10% water transpires. Surface water or groundwater are used as a source for (potential) satisfaction of human needs – particularly, for production of drinking water.

Only a small quantity of water on the Earth can be processed and consumed. This is among reasons why approximately one fifth of the people on the Earth do not have a reasonable approach to the healthy drinking water. Lack and/or contamination of drinking water results in losses of million of lives, typically in the underdeveloped countries.

On the territory where SmVaK operates, 95% of sources for drinking water is supplied from the dams in the Beskydy Mountains (Šance and Morávka) and in the Jeseníky foothills (Kružberk and Slezská Harta). Water flows to the customers through the backbone pipeline - the Ostrava Area Water Network.