Dr. Keith Explores is a new blog series written by Dr. Keith Yearwood, a geoscientist at the University of Maryland. Dr. Keith takes pieces of our natural world and explains them one at a time, encouraging and helping all of us to be more attentive to our surroundings. At the end of each post is a piece of technology, project, method or organization to help get you started exploring YOUR environment.


We turn on a tap and as if by magic, out flows clear-looking water.  We have each done that thousands of times and we have gotten so used to it that we take it for granted. Have you ever wondered from where does the water come?  As you think about this, have you ever wondered about some of the substances that can make our tap water unsafe to drink? It looks clear and clean and maybe it is. Suppose there is something inside that is harmful to us and we don’t know it?  How do harmful substances get into our drinking water?


It would be wonderful to answer these types of questions because everyone would like to clean water that is free of harmful substances and chemicals. We call these harmful substances pollutants. For us to answer these questions, we need to go back to the very beginning and investigate the source of our water, that is, from where does it come?  


As we do that we may be able to understand how humans may be causing some of the water pollution problems that we are trying to avoid! Since some of those problems may be caused by us, perhaps there are solutions that we can find that will help to reduce the amount of pollutants in our fresh water.


Since we all use fresh water, we all have to do our bit to ensure that our planet has clean, fresh water for all its people. Although water pollution problems may not have been caused by everyone, it is everyone’s business to find a way to solve them.


We all are part of the solution and you will discover that your small efforts do add up towards making a huge contribution to fixing this problem! Everything you can do to fix this problem is guaranteed to help us in our fight to erase water pollution.


So for the next few lessons, out focus will be on water pollution and how we can make our planet have nicer, safer, cleaner drinking water.


Trace your Water Source! Use this web-map by the Nature Conservancy to learn about sources of water in major cities around the world.