World first - Qld may implement 100% recycled drinking water ...

Excerpt from the Chronicle (annotated):

Qld may implement 100% recycled drinking water

25 January 2007

New laws allow for desperate measures

By Rebecca Vonhoff

Rosemary Morley and opponents of drinking recycled water call the process "toilet to tap".

Acting Premier Anna Bligh calls it a necessary measure in an emergency water shortage situation.

Semantics aside, Mrs Morley says she is "horrified" by comments made by Ms Bligh that focus attention once more on the percentage of recycled water present in drinking water if the controversial water scheme for South-East Queensland goes ahead.

During last year's Water Futures debate, a 25% recycled water component was proposed.

But Ms Bligh yesterday said the Government is prepared to use up to 100% recycled sewage in an emergency situation to bolster water supplies for Queensland's south east.

Ms Bligh said the government had advice [from whom?] that in an emergency situation - where dams reached critical levels, up to 100% recycled water could be safely introduced.

"The question we have asked the Queensland Water Commission is at what point would the dam have to be for the Government to say this is an emergency and therefore we are going to have to put in recycled water even if we had a No vote," Ms Bligh said.

"At that point, we would be putting the amount of water that is available in the (recycled water) pipe into the dam.

"The advice we have [from whom?] ... this water is 100% safe [where's our guarantee?], so it doesn't matter whether (the level) is 1% or 40% or 80%."

But Mrs Morley disagrees.

"If they do this, it's going to be the first time in the world," she said.

"People should be up in arms about this and alarm bells should be ringing for everyone."

"It's complete madness that flies in the face of advice from the CSIRO, that testing should take place for three to five years before we drink this water."

"If Wivenhoe is full of recycled water, there can't be a testing period because even if Traveston is online, that dam supplies a huge amount of the South-East Queensland population with water - they can't afford for it to be offline."

Ms Bligh's comments came as she announced she would use special legal powers, which State parliament approved late last year, to fast-track a number of key water projects.

The move by the Government yesterday to use its special State development powers followed advice that inflows to Wivenhoe Dam were the worst on record.


There is nowhere else on the planet that Deputy Premier Anna Bligh can point to as a comparable example. Nowhere ...