What standards must be met by our nations water quality systems? First it must be decided on how a body of water will be used. Different uses cause different concerns, so therefore different standards will obviously need to be considered. Who decides these standards, and concerns?

Environmental scientists work in an effort to understand how each system works or functions and determines where a waters source is coming from allowing them to discover any contaminates. Environmental lawyers work to ensure that water is maintained at the correct quality for its purpose or identified use.

Most water on the earth is not suitable for consumption, potable or even toxic. This is not even including sea water. Earths polution plays a major role in water pollution, turning potable or drinking water into polluted water. Water quality is very complex and is tied directly into the earths ecology.

Pollution as mentioned above plays a large role in keeping large amounts of our earths surface water from being consumable by humans. Industrial pollution, storm water runoff, runoff from agricultural areas and the discharge or sewage are hurting our earths resources for good clean drinking water. In an attempt to conserve water, many people are now turning to rainwater harvesting and catching access rainwater in rain barrels. This small attempt to conserve water can actually help cut your homes landscaping and lawn water usage by 30%.

We see on a growing basis that water quality is often not up to standards for human consumption. This can be caused from bacteria and micro organisms, chemical spills, sewage runoffs or spills, and pesticides causing many people to have to boil their water before they can drink it. With such a growth in our nations population, it is no wonder why water quality is such a big issue today, and will continue to grow.

Here in the United States our water quality standards are set forth by state agencies for different types of water bodies and their locations. As part of the Clean Water Act, each jurisdiction must submit reports of water quality in their area, whether it be state, tribal entities, or territories. This clean water act or CWA insures that everyone in the US is ensured clean drinking water.

Do your part to cut back on pollution, trash, and waste. Help keep the earth clean, keeping runoff, oil, and sewage out of our drinking water. Take part in world water monitoring day, that is an international education that outreaches to help build public awareness and stimulate involvement to help protect our water recources, not only here in the United States, but around the world.

It is very complex and interlocks statutes of common law, treaties, regulations, policies, conventions…etc. In an attempt to regulate the interaction of humans and the environment on a level that allows all to operate peacefully and uniformly keeping the earth from being destroyed by those both greedy and negative towards mother earth.

What factors of mother nature does environmental law deal with on a daily basis? A few categories it keeps in check are that of air quality, water quality, global climate changes, agriculture, pesticides, species preservation, waste management and hazardous chemical storage, treatment and management.

Research to improve our nations environmental law is on going and laws are changing or being added on a daily basis, as it is seen fit to do so.  Some new laws go into effect as a means of experimentation to see how they not only affect the earth and environment, but also the general population who has to abide by the new law. These experimental laws are usually outside the bounds of traditional command and control regulations. A good citizen with good concience does not need many environmental laws in place to tell them what they can and cannot do or what they should or should not to protect mother earth.

Many environmental laws are common sense. Most people would know not to dump toxic waste into our drinking water or oceans, but there are people out there in the world today, who because of greed and money do not care about our earth or what happens to it. There are also a select few who choose to recycle certain commonly used products such as aluminum cans, plastic bottles and recyclable packing peanuts. On the other hand, you have people who are the exact opposite and could care less about the mess the make and the trash they create. This is the exact reason we have environmental firms who run staffs of environmental lawyers to prosocute those destroying the earth.

If you wish to pursue a career in environmental law, consider attending an environmental law school. There are many schools throughout the united states dedicated to teaching students the essentials of law put into place to protect our beatiful earth. Throughout this blog we hope to touch on the many aspects of how laws are set into place for not only our benefit but to benefit the earth and all its inhabitants. Please come back often and feel free to leave comments for others to read.