What amount of fresh water on earth is actually readily available to use?

Options

A. 0.01
B. 0.02
C. 0.03
D. 0.7

Explanation

To determine the amount of fresh water on Earth that is readily available for use, we can follow these steps:

### Step 1: Understand the Total Water Composition on Earth
- The total water on Earth is made up of 100% water. This includes both fresh water and saline (salt) water.

### Step 2: Identify the Percentage of Fresh Water
- Out of the total water, only 2.6% is fresh water. The remaining 97.4% is saline water found in oceans and seas.

### Step 3: Analyze the Fresh Water Distribution
- Out of the 2.6% of fresh water, a significant portion is not readily available for use:
- A large part of this fresh water (approximately 2% of the total water) is frozen in polar ice caps and glaciers, making it inaccessible for immediate use.

### Step 4: Calculate the Readily Available Fresh Water
- The remaining fresh water is approximately 0.6% of the total water. However, most of this (0.59%) is groundwater, which requires extraction and is not readily available.
- Only about 0.01% of the total water is found on the surface (like rivers, lakes, and reservoirs) and is readily available for human use.

### Step 5: Conclusion
- Therefore, the amount of fresh water on Earth that is readily available for use is **0.01%**.

### Final Answer
- The correct answer is **0.01%**.

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