The islands do not have any rivers, but small brackish ponds are found on some islands. Rainwater is collected through water harvesting on a small scale and used for drinking purposes.

 

Groundwater is found in freshwater lenses underlying the atolls and floating on top of the saline water. Heavy abstraction of this as the main source of drinking water has depleted the freshwater lenses, especially in the capital city of Male, causing salt water intrusion. Groundwater is recharged by rainfall but becomes contaminated while percolating through the soil, which is generally polluted with organic and human wastes. A rough estimate of the groundwater resources, based on an assumed 0.1 m/year recharge throughout the country (300 km2), is 0.03 cubic kilometers per year (km3/year), which would be the only renewable resource of Maldives, though hardly exploitable because of seawater intrusion and pollution. 

 

Maldives finds it extremely difficult to obtain suitable drinkable water. In 1991, there were three desalination plants in operation with a total production of 1,000 m3/d. 

 

According to 1990 statistics, 98 percent of the urban population in the city of Male and 57 percent of the rural population on the atolls had access to safe drinking water. 

 

The World Bank reports that at least 80 countries have water shortages and 2 billion people lack access to clean water. More disturbingly, the World Health Organization has reported that 1 billion people lack enough water to simply meet their basic needs, unfortunately in many countries water is scarce or contaminated.

 Pure Aqua provides wide range of filtration and economical solutions based on the Maldives' water resources.

Maldives' main water resources are:

• Surface water is water from river, lake or fresh water wetland, which can be treated using different methods, such as Ultrafiltration Systems, Brackish Water RO.
• Desalination can be used for water from ocean, or sea source, which can be treated using Seawater Reverse Osmosis Systems; Desalination Systems.
• Ground Water or brackish water is from water located in the pore space of soil and rock “Borehole well”, which can be treated using Reverse Osmosis Systems, Chemical Dosing, UV Water Sterilizers.
• Government water supply, which could have high level of hardness or high level of chlorine, can be treated with Water Softener Systems, Media Water Filters.

Pure Aqua manufactures water treatment systems that meet the World Health Organization requirements.