Hydrosphere

The Hydrosphere

The Hydrosphere

The hydrosphere includes all of the water on Earth:

• Water vapor in atmosphere
• Ground water
• Water frozen in glaciers
• Ocean, lakes, swamps
• Running water in rivers, creeks

and streams on land

The Earth

71% of the Earth’s surface is
covered by oceans and seas.

96.5% of the Earth’s water is in
the oceans
1.7% is in glaciers and
permafrost
1.7% is in groundwater
0.1% is everywhere else

Our Water

On the planet, we have 1,365,502,142 km3of water.

This is 360,727,503,350,000,000,000 gallons.

Precipitation

80% of the precipitation on Earth falls directly into the ocean.

20% of the precipitation falls over land

Precipitation over Land

Precipitation over land has 2 routes that it may follow:

1) It can become part of runoff (streams and rivers) which
lead back to the ocean

2) It can be temporarily stored in lakes, swamps,
snowfields, or become part of groundwater

Snowfield vs. Permafrost

A snowfield is an amount of
snow that will eventually
melt as seasons change

Permafrost is snow that has
collected in an area that will
always be there