where is the majority of earth's fresh water found
precipitation
title: Fresh water text: Africa. Out of all the water on Earth, saline water in oceans, seas and saline groundwater make up about 97% of it. Only 2.5–2.75% is fresh water, including 1.75–2% frozen in glaciers, ice and snow, 0.5–0.75% as fresh groundwater and soil moisture, and less than 0.01% of it as surface water in lakes, swamps and rivers. Freshwater lakes contain about 87% of this fresh surface water, including 29% in the African Great Lakes, 22% in Lake Baikal in Russia, 21% in the North American Great Lakes, and 14% in other lakes. Swamps have most of the balance with only a title: Fresh water text: Fresh water Fresh water (or freshwater) is any naturally occurring water except seawater and brackish water. Fresh water includes water in ice sheets, ice caps, glaciers, icebergs, bogs, ponds, lakes, rivers, streams, and even underground water called groundwater. Fresh water is generally characterized by having low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Though the term specifically excludes seawater and brackish water, it does include mineral-rich waters such as chalybeate springs. Fresh water is not the same as potable water (or drinking water). Much of the earth's fresh water (on the surface and groundwater) is unsuitable for drinking title: Water distribution on Earth text: water is also very unevenly distributed. Although in warm periods such as the Mesozoic and Paleogene when there were no glaciers anywhere on the planet all fresh water was found in rivers and streams, today most fresh water exists in the form of ice, snow, groundwater and soil moisture, with only 0.3% in liquid form on the surface. Of the liquid surface fresh water, 87% is contained in lakes, 11% in swamps, and only 2% in rivers. Small quantities of water also exist in the atmosphere and in living beings. Of these sources, only river water is generally valuable. Most title: Fresh water text: including ponds, lakes, swamps and mires ; lotic which are running-water systems; or groundwaters which flow in rocks and aquifers. There is, in addition, a zone which bridges between groundwater and lotic systems, which is the hyporheic zone, which underlies many larger rivers and can contain substantially more water than is seen in the open channel. It may also be in direct contact with the underlying underground water. The majority of fresh water on Earth is in ice caps. The source of almost all fresh water is precipitation from the atmosphere, in the form of mist, rain and snow. Fresh title: Peak water text: world's supply of clean, fresh water is under increasing demand for human activities. The world has an estimated 1.34 billion cubic kilometers of water, but 96.5% of it is salty. Almost 70% of fresh water can be found in the ice caps of Antarctica and Greenland. Less than 1% of this water on Earth is accessible to humans, the rest is contained in soil moisture or deep underground. Accessible freshwater is located in lakes, rivers, reservoirs and shallow underground sources. Rainwater and snowfall do very little to replenish many underground sources. The amount of available freshwater supply in some regions