What Are Major Water Pollutants?

Water is becoming more and more of a rare resource in the 21st century, suspected to be due to global warming, but the pollution of the Earth's water is something which is continuing, despite the need to preserve it. There are natural water pollutants, but most water pollutants are manmade, and the impact of human beings, in terms of polluting oceans, rivers and lakes, has been vast.

Industrialization

• Since the Industrial Revolution, existing problems of water pollution have been added to by the rapid increase of industrial waste. Pollution has steadily grown with a massive increase in the world's population in the past 100 years, and with new technology there has been more intensive farming and logging. The modern world has seen seas and rivers around the world become a dumping ground, deliberate or otherwise, for water pollutants such as plastic, detergents, fertilizers, animal slurry and logging debris. This has all taken its toll on marine life and, in turn, risks causing an imbalance to ecosystems.

Oil Pollution

• Oil pollution continues to be a problem for the world's oceans and has also contaminated beaches around the world. The topic of offshore drilling is a big issue for many environmentalists who fear another disaster like the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Toxic Waste and Toxins

• Toxic waste in oceans, rivers and lakes is arguably an even more disturbing form of water pollutant. Thousands of deaths in the Indian city of Bhopal in 1984 were caused by toxic gases contaminating the city. The toxic gases eventually got into soil and water. When toxins are present in water, this can affect all the living creatures in the food chain, as infected smaller fish, which are eaten by bigger fish, will then have contaminated the bigger fish.

Sewage

• Water-borne diseases can often be the result of polluted water by sewage and cause diseases such as dysentery, cholera and typhoid. E-coli outbreaks, which are caused by the bacteria found in human sewage, are still not uncommon, despite modern hygiene, even in the Western world.

Algae and Volcanic Ash

• There are some natural water pollutants such as algae that can have a devastating effect on aquatic life; if it's thick enough, it will choke off the supply of oxygen to all creatures living below. Algae can also spread and cover a wide area. Volcanic ash is another natural water pollutant and one which is impossible to control.