[caption id="attachment_75469" align="aligncenter" width="640"] fresh water under ocean[/caption]

Large Underwater Aquifers Found On Ocean Floor

An aquifer is a water source found beneath a layer of rock, silt, or gravel. It is a source for fresh groundwater. A well operates by tapping into an aquifer. Now, Australian researchers have found large aquifers in the ocean floor. The discovery may lead to vast water sources for places previously thought to lack sufficient fresh water. Their research has also found reservoirs in North and South America and China.

How big are the aquifers in question? Researchers believe they may be as large as 500,000 cubic kilometers and contain low-salinity water. Put in other terms, the amount of water they have found is 100x greater than the amount of water extracted from the planet's surface since 1900. The finding is so large that it may resolve or greatly delay the global water crisis which the UN once estimated in the 1990s may eventually lead to global conflicts. Some regions of the world may be able to subsist off these aquifers for generations.

In one sense, the discovery is completely understandable. The ocean is a huge body of water and some of that water would naturally seep into the ground getting filtered in the process. Currently, the only way to extract water from the ocean is via desalination which is a very costly process.

Source material:

fresh water under ocean
http://www.voanews.com/content/huge-freshwater-aquifers-found-under-ocean-floor/1805397.html