Post by tommygun on Apr 30, 2006 18:03:43 GMT -5
There is a federal budget to be brought down in a matter of days.
It is almost a year ago since the then Deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson warned that a then crippling drought could wipe out a third of our economic growth.
I argued then, as I have for years, that virtually nothing has being done about the issue of drought or the absence of water - nothing has been done about this issue for years.
Indeed, after the war, we had the Snowy Mountains scheme.
We built huge dams and hydro-electric power stations.
We had the Ord River scheme in Western Australia and dams in Tasmania.
Since the 1970's, virtually nothing.
And you can bet your life, with billions of dollars in surplus in the budget to be brought down, there will be nothing for dams in the bush or massive recycling in the city.
Yet, large tracts in Australia are in drought.
Sydney's water capacity is heading below 40%.
Goulburn, not far from Canberra, is at crisis point.
Its largest dam is at 0.8% of its capacity.
Rural Victoria is the same.
Bendigo is preparing to buy irrigation water which was previously available for agriculture.
The Hunter Valley in New South Wales, once a license to print money, is worse than it’s ever been in its history.
So, what will the budget and massive surpluses do for this?
You see, we are not short of water, we can't be.
We make our tea with the same water we use to flush the toilet.
Goulburn want a $30 million recycling plant.
Can't someone give it to them?
This is how far behind the times we are.
90% of Singaporean water use to be piped from Malaysia, under a special license, ever since Singapore gained independence.
But when it came time to renew the license, costs had escalated so much that Singapore could no longer afford to buy its water from Malaysia.
So several years ago Singapore started replanning its whole water/sewerage strategy and infrastructure.
It has now completed the installation of a brand new sewerage system which, when fully operational next year, will recycle reprocessed sewage water 100% fit for human consumption.
Yet in Toowoomba Queensland the Mayor wants to do just that.
Yet you've got nothing but delays and dog fights.
Then there is the farming sector.
We are not short of water.
4 billion litres of water is not used in the Ord River system in Western Australia every day.
And the Fitzroy River is 50 times greater than the Ord River and all of that is wasted.
Queensland's north east has four times more water than the Murray Darling Basin.
The Gulf of Carpentaria currently has unused 130,000 available gigalitres.
A gigalitre is a thousand Olympic sized swimming pools.
Years ago, Dr John Bradfield an outstanding Australian hydrological engineer talked about diverting this water, but all we are ever told is why things can't be done.
We can't use the Ord River surplus, we can't use the north east Queensland water, we can't build dams.
When it rains we can't harvest the water.
But we can build a 3200 kilometre pipeline to carry gas from Papua New Guinea to Brisbane.
We can build a fairly useless railway line from Darwin to Alice Springs.
But we can't harvest water, transport water, dam water.
And you'll be given 101 thousand reasons why we can't.
The can-do country that we saw after the war has become a won't-do or can't be done back water.
Pardon the pun.
If Kim Beazley were to put together an infrastructure proposal to Water Australia, he would walk in at the next election.
Meanwhile, Goulburn, the Hunter Valley, Bendigo and metropolitan and rural Australia are meant to accept that this ludicrous state of affairs has to be endured.
This is a national betrayal
AJ
It is almost a year ago since the then Deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson warned that a then crippling drought could wipe out a third of our economic growth.
I argued then, as I have for years, that virtually nothing has being done about the issue of drought or the absence of water - nothing has been done about this issue for years.
Indeed, after the war, we had the Snowy Mountains scheme.
We built huge dams and hydro-electric power stations.
We had the Ord River scheme in Western Australia and dams in Tasmania.
Since the 1970's, virtually nothing.
And you can bet your life, with billions of dollars in surplus in the budget to be brought down, there will be nothing for dams in the bush or massive recycling in the city.
Yet, large tracts in Australia are in drought.
Sydney's water capacity is heading below 40%.
Goulburn, not far from Canberra, is at crisis point.
Its largest dam is at 0.8% of its capacity.
Rural Victoria is the same.
Bendigo is preparing to buy irrigation water which was previously available for agriculture.
The Hunter Valley in New South Wales, once a license to print money, is worse than it’s ever been in its history.
So, what will the budget and massive surpluses do for this?
You see, we are not short of water, we can't be.
We make our tea with the same water we use to flush the toilet.
Goulburn want a $30 million recycling plant.
Can't someone give it to them?
This is how far behind the times we are.
90% of Singaporean water use to be piped from Malaysia, under a special license, ever since Singapore gained independence.
But when it came time to renew the license, costs had escalated so much that Singapore could no longer afford to buy its water from Malaysia.
So several years ago Singapore started replanning its whole water/sewerage strategy and infrastructure.
It has now completed the installation of a brand new sewerage system which, when fully operational next year, will recycle reprocessed sewage water 100% fit for human consumption.
Yet in Toowoomba Queensland the Mayor wants to do just that.
Yet you've got nothing but delays and dog fights.
Then there is the farming sector.
We are not short of water.
4 billion litres of water is not used in the Ord River system in Western Australia every day.
And the Fitzroy River is 50 times greater than the Ord River and all of that is wasted.
Queensland's north east has four times more water than the Murray Darling Basin.
The Gulf of Carpentaria currently has unused 130,000 available gigalitres.
A gigalitre is a thousand Olympic sized swimming pools.
Years ago, Dr John Bradfield an outstanding Australian hydrological engineer talked about diverting this water, but all we are ever told is why things can't be done.
We can't use the Ord River surplus, we can't use the north east Queensland water, we can't build dams.
When it rains we can't harvest the water.
But we can build a 3200 kilometre pipeline to carry gas from Papua New Guinea to Brisbane.
We can build a fairly useless railway line from Darwin to Alice Springs.
But we can't harvest water, transport water, dam water.
And you'll be given 101 thousand reasons why we can't.
The can-do country that we saw after the war has become a won't-do or can't be done back water.
Pardon the pun.
If Kim Beazley were to put together an infrastructure proposal to Water Australia, he would walk in at the next election.
Meanwhile, Goulburn, the Hunter Valley, Bendigo and metropolitan and rural Australia are meant to accept that this ludicrous state of affairs has to be endured.
This is a national betrayal
AJ