#cleanwater Archives

Saratoga Springs Stoked My Love Affair with Water

by OPL | Aug 19, 2022 | People and Planet First, Protect the Planet, Quality of Life

On a recent visit to Saratoga Springs, I learned the extensive history of the area’s natural mineral springs created millions of years ago. It stoked my longtime fascination with water. My love affair with water started in my youth, growing up in upstate New York.

I grew up on the shores of Oneida Lake in upstate New York, surrounded by water in every form. In the summer, the Verona Beach State Park and Sylvan Beach beaches were a haven to enjoy and have fun. In the winter, the snow piled so deep that, at times, we had to climb out of the front window just to remove the snow from the front door so we could open it. On the lake, where the ice was so thick, people drove their vehicles out to their ice fishing huts.

Growing up surrounded by an abundance of water, I was perplexed when I heard a neighbor say that we would be paying for water one day. Why?

It was the 1970s, and any thoughts of climate change were overshadowed by worries of the technological era of spaceship launches. Nuclear explosions were at the forefront of the news and collective thought processes.

As we have learned from hydrology experts, water is not a commodity that should be taken lightly or for granted as it is limited by nature.

According to the National Ground Water Association (NGWA), “The earth has an abundance of water, but unfortunately, only a small percentage (about 0.3 percent) is even usable by humans. The other 99.7 percent is in the oceans, soils, icecaps, and floating in the atmosphere. Still, much of the 0.3 percent that is usable is unattainable. Most of the water used by humans comes from rivers.”

The freshwater supply in Saratoga Springs is a national treasure. Natural mineral springs were created at the Saratoga Fault.

This geologic fault provided the break in shale layers to enable underground streams and a combination of gases and minerals to escape and rise to the surface as natural mineral springs. Water’s taste is impacted by the concentration of minerals such as iron, iodine, zinc, calcium, and magnesium, as well as many electrolytes.

The Mohawk Indians discovered the “healing” springs and believed the water to be a gift from the god Manitou. Introduced in the late 1700s to early settlers, believers of the proclaimed restorative water would later discover several more natural springs. By 1826, bottled water from these springs would be shipped worldwide.

The Saratoga Springs State Park buildings were built in the early 1930s and retain their original exterior appearance, with much of their architectural detailing intact.

The bottling plant was built in 1935. Mineral spring water from three different springs, Geyser, Coesa, and Hathorn, was bottled in iconic cobalt blue bottles and sold in the US and Canada. The coloring of the bottle came about as mineral spring water was once considered a healing tincture. It was fascinating to learn that the plant was in operation until the 1970s, when the New York state-run mineral water bottling plant closed because, at the time, the market for bottled water and, in particular, carbonated water was not popular. It is now the Saratoga Auto Museum, housing many antique cars.

Saratoga Springs Mineral Water bottling company has been in business for approximately 149 years, bottling the nation’s oldest natural and carbonated spring water. The day would not be complete without trying some refreshing natural cold spring mineral water. Carbonated mineral water is deliciously bubbly, refreshing, and has no calories. Like people throughout history, my taste buds recognized this was special water. It reminded me of champagne or Prosecco without the alcohol.

The Mineral Water Bottling Plant

The Mineral Water Bottling Plant was Constructed in 1935 and in operation until the 1970s. It may be hard to believe now, but miscalculation and disbelief that bottled water would never become a successful business enterprise led to its closure. It is now the Saratoga Auto Museum, housing many antique cars.

State Seal Springs Geyser Spring

As a part of the Clean Water and Air Act, the water originally bottled at the Bottling plant was rerouted to this Joseph L. Bruno Pavilion, where the public continues to bottle water from the spring today. This water was so refreshing, cold, and delicious. I wished that I had brought another bottle to fill up. For the courtesy of others who are partaking in bottling water, there is a limit of no more than two five-gallon containers.

Next, we visited the beautiful Hall of Springs and Reflecting Pool.

Constructed in the early 1930s and proclaimed one of the most beautiful buildings in America, the Hall signified the prominent beginning of spa development. With gratitude to President Franklin Roosevelt for preserving the Saratoga Springs Mineral Water area, bathhouses such as the Lincoln Bath House and Roosevelt Baths were created to protect and promote bathing in tempered effervescent mineral water. Known widely as “taking the cure” (associated with tension relief, rejuvenation, assumed healing, and medicinal benefits naturally), mineral water from the Geyser, Hathorn, and Coesa Springs was piped in for visitors to consume while walking or listening to live orchestra music.

Hall of Springs and Reflecting Pool

Hall of Springs and Reflecting Pool Circa early 1930s. This building signified the marked beginning of the spa development benefitting the mind and the body.

With its story-filled buildings, rich history, and delicious mineral spring water, it’s no wonder why guests feel great after their Saratoga Springs visit. I will be back to partake in a mineral bath, a concert at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, and once again stoke my love affair with water.

To learn more about Saratoga Springs’ History, visit discoversaratoga.org.

This experience was shared by OPL Naturalist Yvonne Dwyer.

Learn more about Yvonne.

Environmental Conservation of Our Waterways is Key to Sustainability

by OPL | Aug 11, 2022 | People and Planet First, Protect the Planet, Quality of Life

Environmental conservation of our waterways and land in the United States is key to sustainability. Conservation organizations, landowners, and volunteers spend hours working together to preserve and maintain our waterways’ natural beauty and health. These organizations and their volunteers work to remove a wide variety of inorganic items from waterways, including tires, household appliances, plastics, clothing, glass, and cement blocks. In addition, they work to restore and maintain riparian buffer zones, strips of grasslands, forested areas, wetlands, and farmlands that provide shade and protection along the waterways tract to help enhance water quality. Their actions restore many of our creeks and rivers to their natural beauty and bring them back to life.

One of these organizations is the French Creek Valley Conservancy.

Established in 1982 is the Conneaut Lake-French Creek Conservancy and now named the French Creek Valley Conservancy, concerned citizens formed it to address serious issues facing these important Pennsylvania waterways. French Creek feeds into Conneaut Lake, which is Pennsylvania’s largest lake. Conneaut Lake is an hour and a half north of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and about the same distance when traveling east from Cleveland, Ohio.

Our waterways offer abundant outdoor recreation activities, including fishing, boating, swimming, and watching birds, amphibians, reptiles, insects, and invertebrates in their natural habitats.

Unfortunately, some of these waters are becoming unsuitable for recreation or wildlife habitat. Pollution from raw sewage, stormwater runoff, trash, mine drainage, and industrial chemicals such as herbicides for weed control make these bodies of water unfit for recreation and supporting wildlife species.

On a recent canoe paddling day trip along French Creek, we learned that this waterway is nationally recognized as one of the most biologically diverse waterways in the United States.

We were thrilled to see a bald eagle soaring above us when we slid our canoe into the water. We knew immediately that this nine-mile adventure would be unique and special. We didn’t think we would see more of these majestic eagles as we floated along the creek.

Yvonne Canoeing on French Creek

Bridge along Channel of French Creek

Bank Erosion along French Creek

Osprey Nest in the Trees

French Creek is alive with bird songs from migrating birds.

With the help of the Merlin Bird App, we identified over 40 birds. If you are a birder, you would be in awe of the 379 species of birds that make this great creek their home. For many birds, it is year-round.

The banks of the streams and rivers flourish with several hues of greenery from various ferns, maple, oak, walnut, spruce, wild flowering apple trees in full bloom, and several types of shrubs. Some of the trees appear to be hundreds of years old. With bank erosion from heavy rains and flooding, you can see how high the water once was. As we continued our paddle, we took note of the massive roots on many of the trees exposed on the eroded creek banks. We were amazed that the trees didn’t topple over from the excessive weight above the ground. Native and non-native spring ephemerals such as Dame’s Rocket, Philadelphia Fleabane, Wild Geraniums, Golden Alexander, Common Milkweed, Yellow Buttercups, Violets in purple, white, and yellow colors, Columbine, Sweet Cicely, Purple Crown Vetch, and invasive Japanese Knotweed are just some of the plants we identified along the way.

French Creek has abundant wildlife, as we witnessed firsthand. We spotted freshwater mussels, amphibians, reptiles, fish, Tiger Swallow Butterflies, and Red-spotted Butterflies, among other species.

According to the French Creek Valley Conservancy, “the French Creek watershed contains over 80 species of fish and 27 of Pennsylvania’s approximately 65 species of native freshwater mussels, including threatened and endangered, the most diverse population of any stream in the state and any stream further north and east in the nation. Mussels require clean, oxygen-rich water to filter food and absorb dissolved oxygen. In the microscopic larval stage, they often attach to fish gills such as darters and are transported to different sites on the stream. As a result, their distribution and number are directly linked to the host fish’s survival.”

To learn more about waterways near you, visit your local water conservation organization and federal, state, and local parks.

These organizations support aquatic science, riparian plantings, aquatic connectivity and species passage, safety on the waterways, canoe/kayak access development, watershed grant programs, and additional resources to inspire you to get involved.

Let us take action to joyfully preserve and sustain our natural world and its inhabitants for future generations. Download our One Planet Life app to access other insightful posts, resources, and organizations that you can participate in and track your actions.

We Should Never Take Water for Granted. Especially Now.

by OPL | Jul 31, 2022 | People and Planet First, Protect the Planet, Quality of Life

Two hydrogen and one oxygen molecules create the mercurial substance that sustains all life. It is the only natural substance found in all three physical states at temperatures that occur on earth. We experience water as a liquid in rivers, lakes, and oceans, a solid in snow and ice, and a gas in clouds and streams. We are from the water, and it brings us joy. And yet, we take water for granted.

With a turn of a knob, water runs freely from the faucet. Clear water flows as if there is an endless amount. Unfortunately, this is an illusion. We have been lulled into a falsehood. Water is both a subtle presence in our daily lives and a powerful force causing harm. Water can harm when there is too much, too little, or when it is polluted. The increasingly intense weather patterns have brought damaging floods, droughts, and polar winter weather. Polluted waterways are harming wildlife around the world.

Water risks are a major humanitarian and environmental threat.

Let’s explore the threats in three dimensions: 1) water access, 2) water stress, and 3) water for wildlife. It is time to open our eyes, understand the water situation in our world, change our relationship with water, and take sustained action.

Water Access – One-in-four people do not have access to safe water. Our bodies are 50% water. We can only survive three days without drinkable water. In developed countries, clean water is transported to our homes, businesses, and farms at a minimal cost. Because of this seemingly easy accessibility, we get the sense that there is an abundant amount and that everyone has equal access. False.

Only 74% of the world has access to safely managed water A shocking 26% — nearly 2 billion people do not have access to safely managed water.

Of these 2 billion, over 1 billion have a 30-minute trip to collect drinking water. The remaining people do not have access to any safe drinking water. Depending on where you live, and your income, your access to water can be vastly different.

To better understand the inequity of water access, refer to CHART 1: Income Impact to Access to Clean Water and CHART 2: Water Accessibility by World Region.

Click to enlarge

Click to enlarge

Water Stress: Freshwater is being used faster than it is being replaced.

About 70% of all people live within 3 miles of the closest water feature. Water is part of every aspect of our life, including our health, industry, agriculture, and energy production. Each person uses on average 1004 gallons of water a day. We use 70% of the world’s water annually for agriculture. The United States uses a large amount of water for industry (18.2 billion gallons per day) and energy production (58 trillion gallons of water per year). We are drawing down too much fresh water between individual, agricultural, and energy production use. There are ways to perform these activities with much less water, yet we continue to use unsustainable amounts of water year after year.

It takes hundreds of years to replenish groundwater.

Climate change worsens the problem by intensifying floods and drought, shifting precipitation patterns, altering water supplies, and accelerating glacial melt and sea-level rise. Already 17 countries (refer to CHART 3) are facing extremely high water stress as their agriculture, industry, and communities use up to 80 percent of the available surface and groundwater each year. Even in countries such as the United States with overall low-medium water stress, some communities are still experiencing highly stressed conditions. The people of New Mexico have as much water stress as some of the most stressed countries. Another four states (Colorado, Arizona, California, and Nebraska) are at high risk and using 40-80% of the available water. When water demand overwhelms supply, there are dire consequences.

Over 50 million Americans live with some amount of water stress today.

CHART 3

Water for Wildlife – Nature needs water and is really good at taking carbon out of the atmosphere.

Wildlife needs water to survive. By letting the byproducts of our daily lives pollute waterways, we are participating in the alarming decline of wildlife globally. Unintentionally we destroy the network of life.

Peter Wohlleben beautifully explains this in his book, The Secret Network of Nature. (Read our review.) Did you know that trees and bears can rely on the nutrients of salmon? Along rivers with low nutrient soil, the salmon swim upriver to spawn while hungry bears and other hunters haul in a meal. When the salmon die, they deposit a wealth of nutrients. Up to 70% of the nitrogen in vegetation growing alongside these streams comes from salmon. In addition, the data shows that Sitka spruce in these areas grow up to three times faster than it would without this natural fertilizer. It is all connected, the water, the salmon, the bears, and the trees. When we block or pollute rivers, we disrupt the network of life.

Our waterways and oceans are dumping grounds. Since 1950, 8.3 million tonnes of plastic containers have been produced. Only 9% gets recycled, and the rest ends up in our landfills and litters our land and waterways. Plastic is problematic in many ways. It degrades slowly; lightweight bags are eaten by livestock and wildlife, and plastic bags are among the most common types of marine litter. At our current pace, oceans will have more plastic than fish by 2050. We need to protect and expand natural places.

Some of the best solutions to our water problem are nature-based solutions. These include restoration of coastal seagrass, regenerative agriculture, and protecting and expanding forests and natural areas. Reducing pollution, protecting natural areas around waterways, and increasing natural habits benefits all life.

Read our blog, It is Time to Love, Care For, and Share our Water, to learn small joyful changes you can make to save water.

It is time to Love, Care for, and Share Our Water

by OPL | Jul 29, 2022 | People and Planet First, Protect the Planet, Quality of Life

We are utterly dependent on water. There wouldn’t be any life on earth without water.

We experience water in many different ways, both positive and negative. It seems so plentiful and readily available to most of us (except for nearly 2 billion people without access to safely managed water) that we can neglect to treat water as a precious life-sustaining resource. To better understand our water’s risks, Read our blog, We Should Never Take Water for Granted. Especially Now.

As each of us takes action to live more sustainably and in harmony with nature, how can we change our relationship with water? If each of us makes small changes to reduce, recycle, and reuse water together, they will add up in a big way!

To help you get started, we share water-saving tips for four high water usage areas: Kitchen, Bathroom, Laundry, and Outdoors.

Reduce water and chemicals while cleaning clothes

Wash only full loads of laundry or use the appropriate water level or load size selection on the washing machine
To save money on your energy bills, set your washing machine to use cold water rather than hot or warm water
Use eco-friendly laundry products
Reduce polyester and other synthetic clothing that release micro-plastics into the water system

Reduce water usage where over 50% of in-home use happens

Turn off the tap while shaving or brushing teeth
Fix any leaking pipes or faucets
Take short showers which use less water than a bath
Use eco-friendly personal products (fewer chemicals in the water and on you)
Install a dual flush or low flow toilet or put a conversion kit on your existing toilet
If updating the bathroom, look for WaterSense products and save with every use

Use less water while enjoying great meals

Eat vegetarian meals several times a week (less water is used growing veggies than meat)
Scrape your plate instead of rinsing it before loading it into the dishwasher
Use a dishwasher — and when you do, make sure it’s fully loaded!
Use eco-friendly cleaning products
Compost instead of using a garbage disposal. The less we put into our water system, the less we have to clean up
Add food waste to your compost pile instead of using the garbage disposal
Don’t use plastic water bottles and keep a bottle of drinking water in the fridge — no need to run the water until it is cold!

Improve efficiency, reuse, and store water

Plant native plants and food gardens that are beautiful and efficient to bring nature closer
Don’t overwater your lawn or water during peak periods, and install rain sensors on irrigation systems
Capture rainwater and stormwater runoff from your roof, driveway, and other areas to use in watering your garden
Plant trees — as many as you can
Clean up and help restore areas around rivers, streams, lakes, and oceans

To learn more about water, we suggest these blogs and books:

We love water, but do you wonder why? We flock to the ocean and lakes to sit quietly, taking it all in. We need water daily to survive. We love to splash and float in water. “The Blue Mind story seeks to reconnect people to nature in ways that make them feel good and shows them how water can help them become better versions of themselves.” Read more.

Nature is a connected network of life that we rarely notice. Peter Wohlleben shares many examples of this interconnectedness so we can begin to see nature in all its beautiful complexity. Based on science, he leads us through life cycles where salmon, rivers, and trees support each other. We learn how wolves, bears, and fish need each other in Yellowstone National Park. To our surprise, trees take loving care of their young. In one chapter, he explores our role in nature. Read more.

This children’s book, We Are Water Protectors, written by Carole Lindstrom and beautifully illustrated by Michaela Goade, serves as a reminder of the importance of protecting our water. It is inspired by Indigenous-led movements to protect our natural resources. Soak up this story as it is read by Joanna Henry. Read more.

Reducing Plastic for Water’s Sake

by OPL | Jun 7, 2020 | People and Planet First, Protect the Planet

We all know intuitively that water and all the living things that depend on it are precious. At the same time, we create tremendous waste in the form of single-use plastic which harms the planet. Reducing our use of single-use plastic aligns our actions with protecting life and the planet.

Since 1950, 8.3 Million tonnes of plastic containers have been produced. Only 9% gets recycled and the rest ends up in our landfills and litters our land and waterways. Plastic is problematic in many ways. It degrades slowly, lightweight bags are eaten by livestock and wildlife, and plastic bags are among the most common types of marine litter. At our current pace oceans will have more plastic than fish by 2050.

Plastic bottles, straws, shopping bags, cups, and food packaging are pervasive in our society. But we can change. Switch to reusable options for liquid containers, shopping bags, straws, and more. It can be rewarding as you notice the dramatic reduction in waste. Begin with one reusable substitution, then add the second and so on.

Every reduction makes a difference for our planet. We hope you join us. One Planet Life.