Water is a valuable resource that is critical for the health, vitality, and long-term sustainability of all-natural ecosystems. For humans, water plays an essential role in food and energy production, transportation, and recreation.

Worldwide, however, water resources are at a risk. Unsustainable population growth, land-use changes, pollution, and global climate change all threaten the distribution, quantity, and quality of the water on which all life depends.

Protecting and preserving our water resources requires that we take a “big picture” approach that addresses where water comes from, where it goes, how it travels, how it is used by living things, what’s in it, and how to remediate problems and develop policies to protect water.