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| - With nearly 2,000 cubic metres of H2O per person and per year, the United States leads the world in water consumption per capita (a large quantity of golf fields and car washing partly explain this massive consumption). In the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, the U.S. comes first for water consumption, then Canada with 1,600 cubic metres of water per person per year, which is about twice the amount of water used by the average person from France, three times as much as the average German, and almost eight times as much as the average Dane. Since 1980, overall water use in Canada has increased by 25.7%. This is five times higher than the overall OECD increase of 4.5%. In contrast, nine OECD nations were able to decrease their overall water use since
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| abstract
| - With nearly 2,000 cubic metres of H2O per person and per year, the United States leads the world in water consumption per capita (a large quantity of golf fields and car washing partly explain this massive consumption). In the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, the U.S. comes first for water consumption, then Canada with 1,600 cubic metres of water per person per year, which is about twice the amount of water used by the average person from France, three times as much as the average German, and almost eight times as much as the average Dane. Since 1980, overall water use in Canada has increased by 25.7%. This is five times higher than the overall OECD increase of 4.5%. In contrast, nine OECD nations were able to decrease their overall water use since 1980 (Sweden, the Netherlands, the United States, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Poland, Finland and Denmark) . Ninety-five percent of the United States' fresh water is underground. One crucial source is a huge underground reservoir, the 800-mile (1,300 km) Ogallala aquifer which stretches from Texas to South Dakota and waters one fifth of U.S. irrigated land. Formed over millions of years, the Ogallala aquifer has since been cut off from its original natural sources. It is being depleted at a rate of 12 billion cubic metres a year, amounting to a total depletion to date of a volume equal to the annual flow of 18 Colorado Rivers. Some estimates say it will dry up in as little as 25 years. Many farmers in the Texas High Plains, which rely particularly on the underground source, are now turning away from irrigated agriculture as they become aware of the hazards of overpumping .
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