When a child is born, its water needs for healthy growth and development are supplied initially by water in the milk it drinks and then by water intake itself. 

Children need more water than adults because they grow – Remember, each new cell that forms has to be filled up mainly with water.

The growth hormone and other water regulators drive the thirst mechanism and the body’s calls for water. Because of that children are constantly and naturally dehydrated. The process of cell expansion and division uses up a great deal of water. Read more

Waterbeds have a bad rap as being a motion sickness inducing relic of the yuppie 80s bedroom. Just the word waterbed brings to mind angular abstract art in varying pastels and mirror-covered, lacquered headboards. Many who have slept in older waterbeds have experienced the discomfort of climbing onto a plastic sack filled with cold water, only to wake up sweaty and stuck hours later. Worse than the temperature differential was the potential of waking up in a pool, rather than a bed.

Since then, waterbed technology has made leaps ahead. Waterbeds are available in varying firmness, ranging from the traditional, wavy bed to beds that are nearly as firm as traditional spring mattresses. One of the major benefits of the waterbed is its maintenance schedule. A traditional mattress needs to vacuumed and flipped every six months to prevent sagging and dust accumulation. A waterbed mattress can be cleaned with a wet cloth. Read more

The best way to determine if a substance is a “mineral” is to compare its properties to the definition of the word “mineral”. 

What is a Mineral?

The word “mineral” is used by geologists for a group of naturally occurring crystalline substances. Gold, pyrite, quartz, calcite and fluorite are all examples of “minerals”.

To be a mineral a substance must meet five requirements:

1. naturally occurring (not made by humans)
2. inorganic (not produced by an organism)
3. solid
4. a limited range of chemical compositions
5. ordered atomic structure  Read more

Introduction

The Marcellus Shale is a sedimentary rock formation deposited over 350 million years ago in a shallow inland sea located in the eastern United States where the present-day Appalachian Mountains now stand (de Witt and others, 1993). This shale contains significant quantities of natural gas. New developments in drilling technology, along with higher wellhead prices, have made the Marcellus Shale an important natural gas resource.

The Marcellus Shale extends from southern New York across Pennsylvania, and into western Maryland, West Virginia, and eastern Ohio (fig. 1). The production of commercial quantities of gas from this shale requires large volumes of water to drill and hydraulically fracture the rock. This water must be recovered from the well and disposed of before the gas can flow. Concerns about the availability of water supplies needed for gas production, and questions about wastewater disposal have been raised by water-resource agencies and citizens throughout the Marcellus Shale gas development region. This Fact Sheet explains the basics of Marcellus Shale gas production, with the intent of helping the reader better understand the framework of the water-resource questions and concerns. Read more

Climate Change and Reservoir Management

Civil engineers at the University of Washington and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Seattle office have taken a first look at how dams in the Columbia River basin, the nation’s largest hydropower system, could be managed for a different climate.

They developed a new technique to determine when to empty reservoirs in the winter for flood control and when to refill them in the spring to provide storage for the coming year. Computer simulations showed that switching to the new management system under a warmer future climate would lessen summer losses in hydropower due to climate change by about a quarter. It would also bolster flows for fish by filling reservoirs more reliably. At the same time the approach reduced the risk of flooding. The findings are published in the Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management. Read more