Every year, the average Briton uses 10,000 gallons of water, 500 per cent more than the average Indian. A fraction of one per cent of drinkable tap water is actually drunk. The biggest domestic water consumer is the toilet -- 2.2 gallons for every flush. Around 32 per cent of our drinking water is flushed down the toilet. It takes half a gallon of water to cook a pot of rice, and a gallon to wash the pot. You need 100 drops of water to fill a teaspoon.

There are about 400 million cars and light trucks in the world today. In 1950, there were 50 million.

Ninety seven per cent of all the water on Earth is salty. Only three per cent is fresh water. Of that three per cent, over two per cent is frozen in ice sheets and glaciers. And that means that less than one per cent of that three per cent fresh water is found in lakes, rivers and underground.

The soft sand that we sink into on the beach, is actually rock. Sand is what a rock becomes after years of being worn down by rivers. Years of sea waves crashing against huge rocks and cliffs makes rocks break into small particles. And ultimately, they end up as sand. The colours of sand -- yellow, red, grey, black -- depend on the kind of rock it comes from. Sometimes, desert sand is carried by winds across great distances to seasides, increasing the amount of sand in the sea.

The great auk is one of the many sea animals that have become extinct. It used to live in the North Atlantic Ocean. It could not fly and was easy to catch. It was hunted for its fat, meat and feathers. People were also afraid of it. In 1834, a great auk was killed in Ireland because people thought it was a witch. The last great auk on earth was killed in 1844.

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