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Last Updated: Thursday, 29 May, 2003, 11:19 GMT 12:19 UK

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How water-wise are you?

Water is essential to life - but how much do you take it for granted? Test your knowledge of H2O in our water quiz

What is the difference, in degrees centigrade, between the freezing point and boiling point of pure water?


	A: 10C


	B: 100C


	C: 1000C

The average amount of water used per day by a person living in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Gambia, Somalia, Mali, Mozambique, Tanzania or Uganda, is the same as someone in a developed country...


	A: Cleaning their teeth with the tap running (10 litres)


	B: Filling up a dishwasher (65 litres)


	C: Taking a bath (200 litres)

In 2000/1, how much water leaked out of pipes every day before it even reached taps in England and Wales?


	A: 320,000 litres


	B: 3.2 million litres


	C: 3.2 billion litres

The Earth�s water exists in three forms � as ice, salt water and as drinkable fresh water. But in what proportions do they occur?


	A: 97% salt water, 2% ice, 1% fresh water


	B: 75% salt water, 5% ice, 20% fresh water


	C: 80% salt water, 10% ice, 10% fresh water

How many Americans say they never drink plain water?


	A: One in ten


	B: One in a hundred


	C: One in a thousand

Russia�s Lake Baikal is the world�s deepest lake � reaching a depth of 1,700m � but how much of the Earth�s precious fresh water does it contain? Enough to quench the thirst of everyone on Earth for...


	A: One month


	B: One year


	C: 50 years

"Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink." This is a famous quote from which literary work?


	A: Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea


	B: Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner


	C: Nicholas Monsarrat's The Cruel Sea

America�s infamously inhospitable Death Valley receives less than 5cm of rain each year. How much water falls annually on the town of Arica in Chile, the driest inhabited place on Earth?


	A: 7cm


	B: 7mm


	C: 0.7mm

How many people drowned in 2000, according to the World Health Organisation?


	A: 4.5 million


	B: 2.2 million


	C: 450,000

How many people died in 2000 from diseases associated with lack of access to safe drinking water, and poor hygiene, according to the World Health Organisation?