Aquifers and Inner Lives with Mary Bruno Sunday, January 22 at Vashon Center for the Arts.

Thirty percent of the planet’s fresh water resides underground. The world’s aquifers, which supply fresh water to hundreds of millions of people, are being drained at an alarming rate, according to recent satellite data from NASA.

This talk explores the nexus of the physical and human aquifers, hidden caches of an essential substance that are unique, fragile and increasingly threatened. How do they form and behave? What nurtures and endangers the Earth’s inner life and our own?

Mary Bruno has a masters degree in aquatic ecology and more than 25 years as a writer, editor and editorial director for a variety of print and online publications, including Newsweek, Seattle Weekly, ABCNEWS.com and Grist.org. In June 2015, she left her post as Editor-in-chief of Seattle-based Crosscut.com to work on her book about aquifers. Her first book – An American River – is an environmental memoir about growing up along NJ’s Passaic River.

Video by Peter Ray for Voice of Vashon