Water Technology / Treatment

Shared Water Resources: Source of Both Peace and Conflict
From the Euphrates to the Mekong, dams that ensure one country’s water supply risk leaving others parched. But shared water resources can be a source of peace as well as conflict.
- Read more
Groundwater Levels Fall Across Western and Central Kansas
Average groundwater levels across western and central Kansas fell by more than a foot in 2021, with the greatest declines in the southwest portion of the state. “The entire state is currently in some stage of drought and even with recent snowfalls, I bet it remains that way,” one expert said.
- Read more

Lake Evaporation Patterns Will Shift with Climate Change
Lakes serve as a major global source of freshwater. As temperatures continue to get warmer, so will lakes. As global average temperatures rise, lake evaporation is projected to increase at double the rate of ocean evaporation. However, future increases in lake evaporation vary substantially across regions.
- Read more
Water Resources Depletion Near Large Urban Areas
Researchers analyzed the spatial distribution of water resources depletion in connection with proximity to large urban areas and defined a model that might prove fundamental to mitigate the impact of urbanization on the ecosystem.
- Read more

Safe Drinking Water Remains Out of Reach for Many Californians
An estimated 370,000 Californians rely on drinking water that may contain high levels of the chemicals arsenic, nitrate or hexavalent chromium. Researchers say that Californians impacted by unsafe drinking water from other compounds for which data are not as widely available.
- Read more
Radioactive Contamination Is Creeping into Drinking Water Around the U.S.
As mining, fracking and other activities increase the levels of harmful isotopes in water supplies, health advocates call for tighter controls.
- Read more

California’s Water Supplies Are in Trouble as Climate Change Worsens Natural Dry Spells, Especially in the Sierra Nevada
California is preparing for a third straight year of drought, and officials are tightening limits on water use to levels never seen so early in the water year. Especially worrying is the outlook for the Sierra Nevada, the long mountain chain that runs through the eastern part of the state. California’s cities and its farms – which grow over a third of the nation’s vegetables and two-thirds of its fruit and nuts – rely on runoff from the mountains’ snowpack for water.
- Read more
Groundwater in California’s Central Valley May Be Unable to Recover from Past and Future Droughts
Groundwater in California’s Central Valley is at risk of being depleted by pumping too much water during and after droughts. Water resources could be pushed beyond recovery in a region that provides about a quarter of the U.S. food supply.
- Read more

Using AI to Provide the World with Drinking Water
Though water covers 71 percent of earth’s surface, more than 2.5 billion people in the world lack access to fresh water at least once a month. Researchers are seeking new possibilities in water purification through using AI agents in the desalination process.
- Read more
Groundwater Flow to Colorado River May Decline by a Third over Next 30 Years
A new study projects that a hot and dry future climate may lead to a 29 percent decline in Upper Colorado River Basin “baseflow” at the basin outlet by the 2050s, affecting both people and ecosystems. Baseflow is the movement of groundwater into streams and, on average, accounts for more than 50 percent of annual streamflow in the Upper Colorado River Basin.
- Read more

Managing Water Resources in a Low-to-No-Snow Future
With mountain snowpacks shrinking in the western U.S., a new Lab study analyzes when a low-to-no-snow future might arrive and implications for water management.
- Read more
Making Desalinated Water Safer, Cheaper
Approximately 80 percent of drinking water in Israel is desalinated water, coming from the Mediterranean Sea. Israeli scientists and colleagues develop an effective and low-cost way to remove toxic boron from water in the process of desalination.
- Read more

Nuclear Physics Used to probe Floridan Aquifer Threatened by Climate Change
Florida is known for water. Between its beaches, swamps, storms and humidity, the state is soaked. And below its entire surface lies the largest freshwater aquifer in the nation. As rising sea levels threaten coastal areas, scientists are using an emerging nuclear dating technique to track the ins and outs of water flow.
- Read more
Avoiding Water Bankruptcy in the Drought-Troubled Southwest: What the U.S. and Iran Can Learn from Each Other
In August, the U.S. government issued its first ever water shortage declaration for the Colorado River, triggering water use restrictions. The fundamental problem is the unchecked growth of water consumption. The Southwest is in an “anthropogenic drought” created by the combination of natural water variability, climate change and human activities that continuously widen the water supply-demand gap.
- Read more
Lowering the High Cost of Desalination
Removing salt and other impurities from sea-, ground- and wastewater could solve the world’s looming freshwater crisis. A suite of analytical tools makes it easier for innovators to identify promising research directions in making saltwater potable.
- Read more

More headlines