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Rainfall and Water-Supply

1908; Nature Portfolio; Volume: 77; Issue: 1995 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1038/077286a0

1476-4687

Transboundary Water Resource Management

IT happens that rainfall is not only the most difficult of all the meteorological distributions to map accurately, it is also that one which is of the greatest importance, for by rain the rivers are fed, and the rivers both water and drain the land. Every year makes clearer the vast national importance of accurate knowledge of the rainfall of a county, for the problem of the rivers is becoming acute. The growing populations of the great towns are tapping the upper waters and diverting the water from its natural channels, and at the same time they are polluting the lower courses with the waste of the factories and the streets. Toll is taken all along the banks of industrial streams for raising steam and carrying on the multitudinous processes of manufacture. There is sometimes anxiety as to whether the waterways can be kept sufficiently supplied to float the water-borne traffic or to fight the silting action of the tides, and there is growing alarm as to the possibility of fish traversing the depleted and polluted streams to reach their spawning beds.