Water Pollution

 Water pollution is the  (e.g. lakes, rivers, oceans, aquifers and groundwater). Water pollution occurs when pollutants are directly or indirectly discharged into water bodies without adequate treatment to remove harmful compounds.Water pollution affects plants and organisms living in these bodies of water. In almost all cases the effect is damaging not only to individual species and populations, but also to the natural biological communities.Water pollution is any contamination of water with chemicals or other foreign substances that are detrimental to human, plant, or animal health. These pollutants include fertilizers and pesticides from agricultural runoff; sewage and food processing waste; lead, mercury, and other heavy metals; chemical wastes from industrial discharges; and chemical contamination from hazardous waste sites. Worldwide, nearly 2 billion people drink contaminated water that could be harmful to their health.

In developing countries, 70 percent of industrial wastes are dumped untreated into waters, polluting the usable water supply.On average, 99 million pounds (45 million kilograms) of fertilizers and chemicals are used each year.Portland, Oregon, is actively pursing “green roofs” and “green streets” to prevent sewer overflows into the Willamette River. Chicago, Illinois, now has more than 517,000 acres (209,222 hectares) of vegetated roofs—more than any other U.S. city—which are helping to catch storm water, cool the urban environment, and provide opportunities for rooftop gardens.

The nuclear crisis that occurred in Japan after 2011 Tsunami prompted Japanese government dumped 11 million liters (2 million gallons) of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean. The Ganges river in India is one the most polluted in the world. It contain sewage, trash, food, and animal remains.

Over 70% of these people who lack sanitation, or 1.8 billion people, live in Asia.Sub-Saharan Africa is slowest of the world’s regions in achieving improved sanitation: only 31 percent of residents had access to improved sanitation in 2006.In Southern Asia, 63% of rural people – 778 million people – practice open defecation.The UN estimates that the amount of wastewater produced annually is about 1,500 km3, six times more water than exists in all the rivers of the world.

One of the world's most polluted rivers flows through Argentina's capital Buenos Aires and threatens the health of the city's poorest people.In present In Chennai, India, over-extraction of groundwater has resulted in saline groundwater nearly 10 km inland of the sea and similar problems can be found in populated coastal areas around the world.

In 1959, the Cuyahoga River in Ohio became famous for being "the river that caught fire." This grabbed the attention of Time magazine, which described it as "Some river! Chocolate-brown, oily, bubbling with subsurface gases, it oozes rather than flows." The Cuyahoga fire and the resulting coverage are considered events that helped kickstart the environmental movement of the 1960s.

It has been more than half a century since that incident. Despite mounting support for the environment, there are still many massively polluted bodies of water across the planet. This gallery highlights 11 of the most polluted rivers in the world, which is but a small fraction of the earth's contaminated rivers, lakes, and oceans.