The driest continents is______.

Good morning. This morning we are continuing our look at Australia and its natural problems.  Australia is a dry continent, second only to Antarctica in its lack of rainfall.  Long hours of hot sunshine and searing winds give Australia an extremely high rate of evaporation, for more than in most other countries.  It is estimated that approximately 87% of Australia’s rainfall is lost through evaporation, compared with just over 60% in Europe and Africa and 48 % in North America.
   Remarkably, underground water sources in Australia supply about 18% of total water consumption. So you can see it is quite an important source of water in this dry land.
    So most of the consumption of water in Australia comes form water which is kept above ground. More than 300 dams regulate river flows around the country.  The dams store water for a variety of functions, the rural irrigation of crops, without which many productive areas of the country would not be able to be farmed; the regulation of flooding, a serious problem which will be dealt with later in the course; and last but not least, the harnessing of the force of gravity for the generation of electricity.