Living on Cedar Creek Lake during the ongoing Texas drought no doubt made a strong impression on a group of young students enrolled in a Kemp school.

The students of the Kemp Junior High School Gifted and Talented Program presented their slide show, “The State of Our Water: A Kemp Junior High Gifted and Talented Investigation,” to the Kemp Independent School District trustees recently.

The investigative report, which was presented in an 81-slide Power Point forum, covered every aspect of the source, treatment, use, abuse and future of water in today’s world. The students noted the North Texas area’s population is expected to grow to 13 million people by 2060, creating an enormous demand in this area of Texas.

The students researched public and private water systems, water shortages, water wars, water desalination, water treatment, bottled water, water in the human body, the effect of bad water on the human body, water testing, the contents of acid, alkaline, fluoride and chlorine in water, the proliferation of pharmaceutical drugs in water and the future of water treatment plants.

Because of the ongoing, worst drought in memory, seven states in the nation are running out of water, with California suffering the most. The other six states are Nevada, New Mexico, Kansas, Arizona, Oklahoma and Texas.

The points made by the students included:

The world’s total water sources are combined of 97 percent salt water and three percent fresh water. Only one percent of fresh water supplies are now available for human consumption.

Agriculture use accounts for 70 percent of the use of fresh water. In food production, the growth of one pound of beef consumes 1,857 gallons of water.

The average person uses 167 gallons of water per day. A running faucet wastes three gallons of water per minute and a running water hose wastes six gallons per minute.

Many of the bottled water products being sold today use tap water, and they are manufactured by soft drink companies. The plastic bottles also contribute to environmental pollution.

Extreme dehydration, or the insufficient presence of water in the body, can lead to death in three days. Signs of dehydration include yellow or dark urine.

Hyponatremia, or the overabundance of water in the body, can lead to seizures, comas and death.

Germs found in water include salmonella, rotaviruses and cryptosporidiosis. Ailments range from extreme diarrhea to typhoid fever and cholera.

The most extreme droughts in the world, North Africa, the Middle East and Asia, are also the sites of brutal conflict. Throughout history droughts have led to migrations and invasions.

Some of the solutions to the national and international water shortages include the cessation of fracking to produce petroleum products, the dumping of toxic wastes, the building of nuclear plants near water sources and agricultural products runoff into rivers, lakes and the oceans.

The students’ report is available online in the Power Point presentation and as a video. Visit http://kemp.ednet10.net/WebCampus/JHWeb/index.html