Referendum on treated sewage as drinking water
July 20th, 2006Free fortnightly bulletin
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Water vote critical for Australia says Don Burke
Don Burke, the Chairman of the Australian Environment Foundation (AEF) today urged all Toowoomba residents to vote ‘Yes’ in the upcoming referendum.
With Australia’s current water situation whether Toowoomba decides ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to be the first Australian city to recycle sewage as drinking water it won’t be the only city to face the issue.
“While the major cities have so far failed to address the issues of water recycling, Toowoomba is leading the country, which is why I am specifically interested…..With Toowoomba’s Waterfutures project we may well see the model that all major Australian cities will adopt in the future and the AEF supports this innovative move,” says Don.
Toowoomba, Australia’s largest regional inland city is situated at the headwaters of the Murray Darling Basin on the edge of the Great Dividing Range and has exceeded the capacity of its current water infrastructure.
The proposal is for Toowoomba to use ‘planned indirect potable reuse’, the same system as used by Singapore and Atlanta. Don Burke says that at the moment Toowoomba’s sewage is actually being used as drinking water.
“Toowoomba’s treated sewage is currently discharged into Gowrie Creek, which empties into Oakey Creek, which then empties into the Condamine River. The town of Dalby draws its water from the Condamine River.”
“Some cities and towns may well be crippled by the drought, but the smart ones will move to protect their water supplies like Toowoomba is doing,” says Don. “If I could vote on the 29th July, it would definitely be ‘Yes’ and not just for Toowoomba, but for Australia’s water future”.
NB The AEF will hold it first Conference over the weekend of the 23rd & 24th September in Brisbane.
Keynote speaker is Mike Archer, palaeontologist, author and Dean of Science at the University of New South Wales, who will plead for the revolution we must have – between the ears and on the land – in our approach to sustaining environments as well as rural and regional communities in a changing world.
Other speakers include Don Burke (Burke’s Backyard), Jennifer Marohasy (Senior Fellow, IPA), Barry Cohen (Environment Minister in Hawke Government) and Michael Duffy (Counterpoint, Radio National). You can download the
brochure at http://www.aefweb.info/
15 Responses to “Referendum on treated sewage as drinking water”
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July 20th, 2006 at 9:33 pm
I may drink it if all the hormones will be taken out .
I really do not want to grow boobs.etc.
Can they be removed ?? I think not.
July 21st, 2006 at 5:01 pm
Following up your question Ray, I was told to check out Windhoek, the capital of Namibia, where they have been gathering experience in the treatment of direct water reclamation from secondary effluent since 1968. A plant reclaiming potable water from a mixture of treated sewage water and highly polluted reservoir water has been operating since December 2002.
http://www.vatech.at/view.php3?f_id=13309&LNG=EN. This operation has been a ‘remarkable success’ and to date, the most stringent drinking water standards have been met without any problems.
Water samples are taken for analysis in the water reclamation plant laboratory every four hours. Regrigerated composite samples are used for a twice-weekly comprehensive analysis of all watere qualoity constituents. To date all the drinking standards have been met without any problems.
http://www.vatech.at/truman/up-media/2373_Potable%20Reuse%20in%20Windhoek1.pdf
It seems the people of Windhoek have even derived some pride from the fact that they are the only ones to practise direct potable reuse worldwide.
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:10 am
Windhoek is not a good example. The recycled water plant is bogged down in legal proceedings.
If recycled water is such a great thing for Namibia, why are they pursuing desalination in other parts of the country?
Another of Toowoomba City Council’s favourite examples – Singapore – has opened the largest desalination plant in Asia as part of their 4 taps policy.
Yet another example, Virginia, now wants to pursue recycled water for non-drinking purposes only.
The real problem with the Toowoomba Water Futures project is that it just doesn’t stack up.
Council has nowhere to send the RO waste stream. (In Singapore, it is pumped out to sea.)
FOI released documents show that Acland Coal is “cool” on the idea of taking the waste to their coal mining.
Without Acland Coal, Council will need to buy land and build evaporation ponds. Council’s own NWC funding application says that this will double the project’s costs.
Who will pay the additional $70 million. Toowoomba ratepayers?
This also ignores the fact that Toowoomba City Council has signed no contract to build the recycled water plant. The estimate of $68 million is at best a guesstimate. With accurate costing and cost increases since their ball park numbers were done and the required evaporation ponds, the project is more likely to cost upwards of $150-200 million.
Why is it that Mayor Thorley won’t discuss the costing of the Water Futures project and just criticises the costings of the alternatives? Because Water Futures is set to be an enormous white elephant with huge cost overruns to be borne by future generations in Toowoomba.
That’s the Thorley legacy!
July 22nd, 2006 at 3:20 am
Quote – “The town of Dalby draws its water from the Condamine River.”
Wrong!
Dalby will be the model town for recycled water use.
Dalby has State and Federal government funding to use coal seam gas water for the town water supply and will use recycled water on its parks and gardens. (Read the April 2006 NWC press release.)
This is a sensible use of resources.
Quote – “The proposal is for Toowoomba to use ‘planned indirect potable reuse’, the same system as used by Singapore and Atlanta.”
Wrong again. Atlanta does not engage in planned indirect potable reuse.
Singapore puts 1% recycled water into their system. Mayor Thorley plans a mix of 25% – 25 times Singapore’s rate. An amount not done anywhere else in the world and an amount which their own consultants, CH2M Hill, think is “high by international standards”. (Quote from Toowoomba City Council’s NWC funding application.)
July 25th, 2006 at 11:02 am
Lawrence,
Dalby does draw its water from the Condamine River and Toowoomba does discharges its treated sewerage into Gowrie Creek which flows into the Condamine.
Now tell us about Atlanta? What do they drink?
Cheers, Jennifer
July 27th, 2006 at 10:17 am
There was a guy on The New Inventors a few weeks ago who had designed a system to recycle sewrage for use as irrigation, and he stated the water at that stage wasn’t good enough to drink. I’m not sure what other treatment would be needed.
Using recycled water for things like irrigation is a great idea, however I’m not sure about drinking it, unless I boil/filter it first.
July 27th, 2006 at 11:41 am
The filter system on the New Inventors was called the Biolytix Filter.
You can read more about the process at ABC New Inventors – Biolytix Filter or at the Biolytix Waste Treatment Systems website.
July 27th, 2006 at 2:01 pm
Dalby’s plan is to use gas water for its town water supply and to use recycled water for parks and gardens.
If you don’t believe me, go to http://www.nwc.gov.au and read the press release and then also go to Dalby Town Council’s website.
Dalby will be the model for recycled water use – it recognises that it no longer wants to draw on river water and wants to put in place a best practice for town drinking water.
August 1st, 2006 at 2:50 pm
I think that you should after all saving resources is a mojor concern
I am still at school and recently in science we drank destilled urine and it tasted cleaner than water from the taps cause that goes through dirty rusty yucky pipes that we cant see
Eeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwww Gross i Know
Thanks for listening
and a m
August 20th, 2006 at 10:44 pm
The problem with the recycled sewage plant proposed for Toowoomba is that it just would not work.
It is not possible to produce 11,000 ML of recycled water from 8,000 ML of sewage. Toowoomba City Council also had nowhere for the RO waste stream to go. Acland Coal did not want it. Singapore pumps its RO waste stream into the sea.
The plant could never have been built for $68 million – closer to $150-200 million would be more accurate when you take into account the hundreds of acres of evaporation ponds required which were not included in the budget.
Regardless of your view on recycled water use, the no vote in Toowoomba was correct because the proposal was a dud.
August 22nd, 2006 at 11:16 pm
Hormones in recycled water is due to the process of taking water from the waterways, treating it drinking it, putting the treated sewage back into the waterways, which is then reclaimed. This process is hundreds of years old and is very wide spread.
The system to be introduced in Toowoomba uses a filter that only allows water molecules to get through. If water molecules were the size of a golf ball then hormones would be the size of basket balls. Hormones will not be in the recycled water in the Toowoomba proposal.
True it isn’t possible to produce 11000ML from 8000ML. Acland coal doesn’t want their 2000ML. So 11000 – 2000, leaves 9000, an awful lot closer to the 8000ML produced from sewage. There are plenty of other companies that could use the waste water, but that is only if people refuse to drink it.
The point is that 8000ML is currently leaving the system can be reclaimed.
More importantly the current water supply, the Dams don’t disappear and will continue to produce water a current 13600ML yield, once you add 8000ML that really does improve the figures significantly. More than another dam would in fact.
http://www.usc.edu.au/NR/rdonlyres/24D5012C-F91A-4C47-8459-CE8005B284E9/0/Dianne_Thorley_WW.pdf#search=%22recycled%20water%20toowoomba%22
Everything I have read refers to the RO system reducing the amount of waste water Singapore dumps into the sea, as this is what they do with their sewage if it isn’t recycled. The waste left from the RO process can be used to produce greenhouse gas neutral power and is one of the best benefits is that this waste. See http://www.fuelcells.org.au/waste-water-recycling-Australia.htm for how it works.
The cost of a RO plant is $68 million compared to other options such as desalination plants that run into the billions. It is relatively cheap, see for details on the NSW plan. http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/sewage-to-star-in-water-plan/2005/07/14/1120934364087.html
Not too mention that most Dams cost in the vicinity of 50 -100’s of millions and they almost always blow out to cost %50 more than the budgeted cost and fail to meet their expected yield. http://www.irn.org/wcd/
Evaporation ponds are not needed in a RO plant. It is reverse osmosis not evaporation. You can go to http://www.gewater.com/pdf/Technical%20Paper_Cust/Americas/English/TP1030EN.pdf#search=%22RO%20plant%20life%20cycle%22 if you want to learn more.
As for where it would go “The answer, according to Toowoomba’s mayor, Di Thorley, lies here at the expanding Wurtulla sewage treatment plant just north of the city.”
http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2006/s1598458.htm
August 23rd, 2006 at 11:03 pm
Ah, that great ‘nothing gets through the membranes’ myth. Even Toowoomba City Council had to admit that that was incorrect. They copied one of the Singapore NEWater brochures but forgot to watch their video closely. Faced with the truth, the Council subsequently reissued their diagram showing that 30mg/l of total dissolved salts (which includes residual chemicals and hormones) gets through the membranes.
The importance of Acland Coal was not that they were taking recycled water but that they were to take the reverse osmosis (RO) waste stream. This is the byproduct of the RO treatment. Without Acland Coal taking it, Toowoomba City Council had nowhere for it to go. (State government emails confirmed that Acland Coal did not want it.) Council was faced with building 600 hectares of evaporation ponds to store the RO waste stream.
The evaporation ponds were estimated by Council’s advisers, CH2M Hill, in the National Water Commission funding application as costing an additional $70 million. (Evaporation ponds are required as part of the RO process if you don’t have someone like Acland Coal to take the RO waste stream – suggest reading the Council’s NWC funding application to confirm this.)
Toowoomba City Council marketed the Water Futures recycled sewage plant on the basis that it was the cheapest option. By costing at least double, it blew Mayor Thorley’s campaign ‘out of the water’.
Expanding Wetalla (spelt correctly) would do nothing for the RO waste stream – it is by definition waste and must go somewhere. One of the other options proposed by CH2M Hill was to pump it out to sea (as Singapore does) using a pipeline from Toowoomba to the coast but this was hardly practical!
August 23rd, 2006 at 11:19 pm
I’d like to read that funding application – sounds like it spills the beans on your Mayor’s proposal.
August 11th, 2007 at 4:36 pm
People should think about the idea before passing down the idea so fast. Recycling sewerage into water could make a real difference to Australia!
September 13th, 2007 at 10:49 pm
Hi there,
A simple answer that is used in many parts of the world is a town’s river water inlet is down stream of their outflow. This forces towns to put out clean water for the next town down stream instead of copping the upstream’s sewage! Legislation should be made to ensure that this happens. Look at the number of towns along the Mississippi/Misouri. How could they survive without this process? This is simply looking after your neighbour.
Bill C.