Mike Rann has decided to desalinate water for Adelaide rather than what I believe is the more environmentally choice of recycling wastewater (i.e. effluent). ABC News reports that a deal has been struck to build a pilot plant at Pt Stanvac [edit: website since removed].
ABC News – Pt Stavac desal plant
It’s great to see the government acting on our water security, but are we really going about it the right way? Does desalinisation provide the best environmental solution overall, considering the amount of electricity required? How much electricity does desalinisation require compared to recycling wastewater? Has the government published their findings on this study (which I like to think they would have done) – and if not, why not? I suspect it’s because the answer is that even though recycled wastewater uses less electricity and other infrastructure than desalination, Mike Rann knows that people won’t at first accept the idea of drinking recycled water, and doesn’t want to lose hist seat as Premier.
Mike Rann features on the front page of his Water Proofing Adelaide website [edit: website since removed], which presents to the public the SA Governments 20 year plan for our water supply. A page of this website is dedicated to displaying a list of the Options Assessed [edit: website since removed], but the only effluent recycling discussed is the Local Wastewater Recycling option [edit: website since removed]. Sure, wastewater recycling on small scales is probably not very efficient, and high maintenance, etc. But what about large scale wastewater recycling? Desalinating water on a local basis probably isn’t very efficient either (not that I’m suggesting it’s ever very efficient), so am I missing something that Mike Rann and the South Australian Government have not officially considered large scale wastewater recycling? Another blogger reports how Singapore uses recycled water on a large scale, why can’t we too? A valid reason I can appreciate as to why Mike Rann decided to go for the desalinisation plant at Pt Stanvac is one, for water security. However, I think we’re a fair way to go before we have to be concerned about not having any drinking water.
Where is the independent engineering report that considers large scale wastewater recycling? C’mon Mike Rann, thanks for the desalinisation plant but since 1.02kg (a figure I got from an Australian Government website somewhere late last year) of carbon dioxide is produced per 1.00kWh of electricity is consumed in South Australia, I’d prefer it if we could produce water the least energy and infrastructure intensive way possible.
In summary, given that Australia is one of the biggest carbon emitter per capita out of any nation in the world, combined with the fact that we have the responsibility of being a leading nation to other developing nations, I strongly feel that we should be taking the most environmentally friendly solution for our water supply and get over our fears of drinking recycled effluent.
I would love it if people could please leave a detailed comment, explaining to me what they understand is the best thing to do for water supply in Adelaide.
