How Much Water is On Earth? 地球上有多少水？ 09 September 2010 4:02 PM ET 2010年09月09日下午04:02 ET If Earth was the size of a basketball, all of its water would fit into a ping pong ball.
How much water is that? It's roughly 326 million cubic miles (1.332 billion cubic kilometers), according to a recent study from the U.S. Geological Survey. Some 72 percent of Earth is covered in water, but 97 percent of that is salty ocean water and not suitable for drinking. 地球上有多少水？據(jù)美國(guó)地質(zhì)調(diào)查局最近的一項(xiàng)研究，大約為3.26億立方英里（13.32億立方千米）。約72％的地球被水遮蓋著，可是97％的水是含鹽的海水，不適合飲用。 "There's not a lot of water on Earth at all," said David Gallo, an oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts. “在地球上必竟沒有很多水”，馬薩諸塞州伍茲霍爾海洋學(xué)研究所（WHOI）的海洋學(xué)家大衛(wèi)·蓋洛（David Gallo）說。 Oceans create a water layer spanning 15,000 miles (24,000 kilometers) across the planet at an average depth of more than 2 miles (3.2 km). If you poured all of the world's water on the United States and could contain it, you'd create a lake 90 miles (145 km) deep. 海洋在地球上創(chuàng)建了一個(gè)橫跨15,000英里（24,000公里），平均深度超過2英里（3.2公里）的水層。如果把所有世界的水都灌進(jìn)美國(guó)，加以圍住，就可以建成一個(gè)深90英里（145公里）的湖。 This seems, and looks, like a lot of water, Gallo told Life's Little Mysteries, but looks can be deceiving. 看起來地球似乎有著大量的水，蓋洛告訴《生活中的小秘密》，然而其實(shí)這可能是欺騙。 If the Earth was an apple, Gallo said, the water layer would be thinner than the fruit's skin. 蓋洛說，如果地球是一只蘋果，水層比蘋果皮還要薄。 The Earth's freshwater is even rarer. 地球上的淡水更為稀少。 "For humanity to thrive, or even exist, we need to sprinkle that teeny bit of fresh water in the right places, at the right times and in just the right amounts," Gallo said. 蓋洛說：“對(duì)于人類的繁榮，甚至他們的存在，我們需要在正確的地方，在適當(dāng)?shù)臅r(shí)間，和以剛好合適的數(shù)量提供所需要的淡水?！?/p> Here's how Earth's freshwater is spread around the globe: 這里是地球上的淡水在各處的分布： 70 percent of freshwater is locked in ice caps 70％的淡水被鎖定在冰蓋里。 Less than 1 percent of the world's freshwater is readily accessible 不到1％的世界淡水是容易獲取的。 6 countries (Brazil, Russia, Canada, Indonesia, China and Colombia) have 50 percent of the world's freshwater reserves 6個(gè)國(guó)家（巴西、俄羅斯、加拿大、印度尼西亞、中國(guó)和哥倫比亞），占有了世界淡水儲(chǔ)量的50％. One-third of the world's population lives in "water-stressed" countries, defined as a country’s ratio of water consumption to water availability. Countries labeled as moderate to high stress consume 20 percent more water than their available supply. 世界上三分之一的人口生活在“用水緊張”的國(guó)家，“用水緊張”的程度用耗水量與水資源可利用量的比值來衡量。把一些國(guó)家標(biāo)定為中度到高度“用水緊張”是它們消耗了超過可供應(yīng)水量的20％以上。 There is much more freshwater stored in the ground than there is in liquid form on the surface, according to the USGS. 根據(jù)美國(guó)地質(zhì)調(diào)查局，更多的淡水儲(chǔ)存在地下，其數(shù)量多于在地球表面上以液體形式所呈現(xiàn)的水。 |
|
|
