Mayor Thorley - do we have any more of our committees ...

... which will agree with me?

At the Toowoomba City Council Committee meetings scheduled this week, the Council will shock and amaze the entire Toowoomba population by announcing that Council's own Environmental Advisory Committee (headed by Councillor Englart and the members of which are selected by Council) has advised that it supports (no, strongly supports) the Water Futures project on environmental grounds.

The EAC believes, following presentations by Council employees, that:

1. The Water Futures project means that creeks will not be altered to build dams.

2. Recycling sewage is an efficient re-use of this resource.

3. Water Futures will reduce the salt load currently discharged into Gowrie Creek.

4. Water Futures will reduce greenhouse gases caused by pumping water long distances.

See - Council Committee meeting agenda - 16-17 May 2006.

Points 1-3 are equally satisfied by using the recycled sewage for non-potable uses.

It is worth noting that Council has still not confirmed that Acland Coal will take the RO waste stream. Expect $70 million in cost overruns (and 68 hectares of contaminated salt) if they don't.

Point 4 over-simplifies the issue. It ignores the greenhouse gases emitted by the Water Futures project.

Perhaps the EAC should also consider the following proposition:

It seems highly likely that a direct consequence of the introduction of recycled sewage into Toowoomba's water supply will be a dramatic increase in the consumption of bottled water.

How environmentally friendly is that?

In contrast to tap water, which is distributed through an energy-efficient infrastructure, transporting bottled water long distances involves burning vast quantities of fossil fuels. Nearly a quarter of all bottled water crossed national borders to reach consumers, transported by train, boat or truck. In 2004 for example, Nord Water of Finland bottled and shipped 1.4 million bottles of Finnish water 4,300 kilometers (2,700 miles) from its bottling plant in Helsinki to Saudi Arabia.

Fossil fuels are also used in the packaging of water. The most used plastic for making water bottles is polythene terephthalate (PTE), which is derived from crude oil. Making bottles to meet America’s demand for bottled water requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel some 100,000 US cars for a year Worldwide, some 2.7 million tonnes of plastic are used to bottle water each year.

After the water has been consumed, the plastic bottle must be disposed of. According to the Container Recycling Institute, 86% of plastic water bottles used in the United States become garbage or litter. Incinerating used bottles produces toxic waste such as chlorine gas and ash containing heavy metals. Buried plastic bottles can take up to 1,000 years to biodegrade. Almost 40% of the PET bottles that were deposited for recycling in the United States in 2004 were actually exported, sometimes to as far away as China – adding to the resources used by this product.

See - Hope Toowoomba environmental newsletter - April 2006.

Perhaps the EAC should have considered this before saying the Water Futures project will be a friend to the environment.

It's interesting that the Council has become quite secretive about the current membership of the EAC (appointed by the Council), stripping out all reference to the EAC on its revamped website.

Some of the EAC members were members of the now defunct Water Futures advisory panel.

Members of the EAC comprise:

- Environmental Groups (4)
- Community (2)
- Business (2)
- Education (2)
- Students (2)
- Councillors (2)
- Council Staff member (1)
- Secondary Students (2)

You can see a photo of some of the 2005 members here - 2005 EAC happy snap.

So, is this really an independent body saying the Mayor's controversial recycled sewage project is environmentally friendly or is it a Council appointed committee bowing to the wishes of Mayor Thorley?

Would any committee member be reappointed if they disagreed with the Mayor?

Just a thought ...