Toowoomba now surrounded by water source options ...
... and doesn't know which way to turn.
The decision by Premier Beattie to sell Qld's electricity assets to fund the construction of two new dams places yet more pressure on the State government and Toowoomba City Council over their controversial recycled sewage project planned for Toowoomba.
The expected $1 billion windfall from the sale of power assets is to be "ploughed into a Queensland Future Growth Fund, to be managed by Treasury, with legislation ensuring proceeds are spent solely on infrastructure needs."
The fund's first projects include financing two new dams, located along the Mary and Logan rivers in south-east Queensland, to be built by 2011.
The Mary River dam, north of Brisbane, will service Gympie and the Sunshine Coast - it will rival the size of Brisbane's Wivenhoe Dam.
A second dam would also be built along the upper reaches of the Logan River, either at the already-proposed Wyaralong Dam site or at Tilleys Bridge, near Rathdowney, providing water to western areas including Ipswich, Springfield and Beenleigh.
Two new weirs will also be built in central Queensland and $300 million invested in clean coal technology.
See - More dams planned for South-East Qld.
Also see - Qld map - Toowoomba surrounded by water source options.
With gas water to provide water to towns to the west of Toowoomba, including Dalby and Chinchilla, and a new dam to provide water to places to the east such as Ipswich and Springfield on the outskirts of Brisbane, any decision by Toowoomba City Council to proceed with its recycled sewage project would leave the city isolated as the only place opting to force its residents to drink recycled sewage.
The second proposed dam would relieve future demand pressure on Wivenhoe dam which raises the question of whether this is Premier Beattie's secret "Plan B" for Toowoomba - linking Toowoomba to Wivenhoe Dam with water to be pumped to Toowoomba in times of drought.
Toowoomba City Council has now admitted that it has sufficient water supplies (through the use of bore water and other water sources) to survive for a number of years. While Wivenhoe dam is currently at low levels, this will not always be the case.
Toowoomba City Council denounced the plan to build a pipeline from Wivenhoe dam to Toowoomba as too environmentally expensive - they claim it is 17% less energy efficient to pump water uphill than the cost of producing recycled sewage.
However, what they fail to state is that any increased energy costs (if accurate) are only incurred in times of need.
Connecting Toowoomba to Wivenhoe dam could easily be completed as part of a whole-of-region approach to water source issues.
Premier Beattie is already planning to link the proposed desalination plant on the Gold Coast to Wivenhoe Dam. It doesn't take too much thinking to link Toowoomba into this strategy ...
posted by Concerned Ratepayer at 6:50 AM
4 Comments:
Shame, shame Mr Beattie, how dare you not include Toowoomba in this new dam scheme.
Where is Mr Shine, or doesn't he care. Or is that Mr Beattie knows that Lyle will win the seat.
Shame on both Beattie and Shine.
9:25 AM, April 27, 2006
It's unbelievable that Brisbane, Ipswich, North Coast get new dams but Toowoomba gets ignored and they won't even give us emergency access to Wivenhoe.
It's unbelievable that a state government could treat a major city this way.
6:52 PM, April 27, 2006
State oppposition press release:
“Panic politics” from Beattie on water
The Beattie Labor Government’s sudden rush to announce new dam projects that have lay dormant for a decade was “panic politics” to cover up their failure to plan for South-East Queensland’s growth, the Queensland Coalition said today.
Shadow Natural Resources Minister Jeff Seeney said the Coalition had been warning for years the Beattie Labor Government’s failure to invest in water infrastructure to cater for population growth would lead to water shortages throughout Queensland.
“A year ago the Beattie Labor Government was claiming ‘Springborg’s dam approach doesn’t hold water’ (Media Release, 17 January 2005) yet now they’ve changed their tune as the realisation of South-East Queensland’s water crisis is finally sinking in,” he said.
Mr Seeney said the rapid growth in South-East Queensland that has led to the need for more water supplies should not have come as a surprise.
“The Beattie Labor Government has been asleep at the wheel on water infrastructure for the past eight years and now they’ve woken up with a start just before the crash,” he said.
“The panic-stricken Premier is now running around saying he will look at dam sites on the Mary River and at Rathdowney near Beaudesert that have lay dormant for more than a decade.
“It’s clear Peter Beattie is desperate to avoid fighting an election on his eight-year track record of failure and is now resorting to panicky promises with no careful planning.”
Mr Seeney said there would have been no need for the panic politics we have seen from the Beattie Labor Government in the past two weeks if they had carefully and consistently planned for South-East Queensland’s water supply needs.
6:57 PM, April 27, 2006
The answer is right there, as Beattie is going to build more dams then it becomes very feasible that we get a pipeline from Wivenhoe Dam to Cressbrook dam and we only draw from it when we are in times of need.
The cost is around $20M and that would be in the council's 10year budget with the money they put aside to spend on the crazy Mayor's crazy recycling sewage plan.
Tell the people that there is other options. This is a con job Thorley and we see right through it.
6:15 AM, April 28, 2006
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