The form of energy associated with the position or arrangement of objects in a system. Second Law of Thermodynamics. States that no enrgy transformation is perfectly effiecients; in a closed system, some energy from every transformation will always be lost as heat, with a corresponding increase in entropy.
When we think of water, we think of rain, lakes and rivers. because they are parts of our daily lives. Water is also found in the atmosphere, underground, in. snow, ice, seas and oceans. It is in constant motion and recycles itself through the Water Cycle. Most of the earthâs water is salty or permanently frozen. 95.1% of water on earth is estimated. to be salt water. Fresh water total only 4.9% of all water on earth. Fresh water is found in. ice, lakes, rivers, streams and underground.
To break the numbers down, 96.5% of all the Earthâs water is contained within the oceans as salt water, while the remaining 3.5% is freshwater lakes and frozen water locked up in glaciers and the polar ice caps. Of that fresh water, almost all of it takes the form of ice: 69% of it, to be exact. If you could melt all that ice, and the Earthâs surface was perfectly smooth, the sea levels would rise to an altitude of 2.7 km. Illustration showing all of Earthâs water, liquid fresh water, and water in lakes and rivers. Credit: Howard Perlman, USGS/illustraion by Jack Cook, WHOI. Aside from the water that exists in ice form, there is also the staggering amount of water that exists beneath the Earthâs surface.