Previous Year Question
With reference to the water on the planet Earth, consider the following statements:
The amount of water in the rivers and lakes is more than the amount of groundwater.
The amount of water in polar icecaps and glaciers is more than the amount of groundwater.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
Correct Answer: B
Detailed Solution
Approximately 96.5% of the Earth’s water is stored in oceans and seas. Only about 2.5% of the Earth’s water is freshwater.
Statement 1 is incorrect: The water present in rivers and freshwater lakes constitutes an extremely small part of the Earth’s total water. Freshwater lakes contain approximately 0.007%, while rivers contain about 0.0002% of the total water. In contrast, fresh groundwater accounts for approximately 0.76%. Therefore, the amount of groundwater is much greater than the water in rivers and lakes.
Statement 2 is correct: Polar icecaps, glaciers and permanent snow contain approximately 1.74% of the Earth’s total water and about 68.7% of the world’s freshwater. Total groundwater accounts for approximately 1.69%, while fresh groundwater accounts for about 0.76%. Therefore, icecaps and glaciers contain more water than groundwater.
The general decreasing order of water reservoirs is: Oceans and seas → icecaps, glaciers and permanent snow → groundwater → lakes → rivers.