I live in Brisbane, in south east Queensland, and the city has historically relied on three dams for all its water. Not so many years ago politicians boasted that the dams were big and we would always have enough water.
Now we have level 4 water restrictions, which means that if I want to water my garden I can only do it on Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday during specified hours and with a single bucket. All hosing is banned. Sprinklers are something we have already almost forgotten ever existed. It really is bizarre that gardening should come to this.
I have written that Brisbane should recycle its water and build a desalination plant or two, click here for the piece entitled 'No More Excuses' originally published in the local newspaper, The Courier Mail.
The Australian Water Association has said that if Brisbane recycled its water there would be 40 percent more water in the system. I am all for it, but the politicians have been dragging their feet while claiming the water crisis is all the fault of climate change. We have had a few dry years, but there are also lots more people. Indeed infrastructure has not kept pace with population in this fastest growing region in Australia.
Then just the other week the Queensland Labor Premier, Peter Beattie, announced that on 17 March 2007 south east Queensland residents will vote on the permanent introduction of recycled water into existing water supplies.
Just today the leader of the Liberal Party, Bruce Flegg, launched a water options website at www.wateroptions.net. There is some good information there about water recycling, water in south east Queensland and attitudes to recycling.
Interestingly local ABC radio has run a poll on water recycling and last time I looked most people (74 percent) just wanted the government to get on with the job of water recycling: http://www.abc.net.au/brisbane/vote/total.htm .
Anyway, if you live in Queensland you can have your say and vote at: http://wateroptions.net/campaigns/1/ .
But if you just want to be really scared click here: https://climatelab.com.au/blog/archives/001514.html .
The problems re household clean water collection are different for different locations; the urban situation limiting scope due to property area and neighbours on top of you, and indeed the contaminants from transport.
Having a small, but 2 story dwelling precludes safe roof access by occupants also. Both my entire boundary fencelines have overplanted
neighbours' trees (loquats one side, tall rainforest the other)which greatly encourage bats and possums periodically. Therefore,I'd question 0.008 ppmv applying to my personal situation which I consider 'abnormal';and the fresh runny stuff being what perturbs me. Yes, lyssa virus is very fragile and doesnt survive, but I was more concerned by other viruses having been implicated in animal deaths (possible bat body-fluids contamination on pastures), and is there now some new question re avian
flu virus and water? Considering the number of times conventional wisdom has needed reformulation
after time yields more information and evaluation, I dont think it unreasonable for individual householders to consider and question any possible impact of the particular aspects of their situation.i.e., pondering the particular as well as the general before making decisions.
Given the level of fetishism present and given that drinking water is such a small portion of total water use, why not just get a roll out plastic liner that is only extended when it is raining? No built up deposits, fresh from the coral sea and directly into the tank.
And run the rest of the house on normal roof water with less than 0.008 ppmv of bat droppings. There is probably more dried bat dropping in powdered form in an hours worth of breathing city air. And as for the contaminants in a train, bus or lift, the less said the better.
There is an easy low cost solution to purification of rain tank water for drinking and cooking purposes. Small low pressure reverse osmosis units that use household water pressure are readily available. They only work with low salinity water but that is no problem with tank water. The water they produce is far purer than any natural source and there is no need to chlorinate it. You wouldn’t use this to purify the entire tank but just for a separate supply for cooking and drinking. A unit the size of two ordinary cartridge type water filters will easily produce 20L/day of high purity water. I used one for some years to purify drinking water from a shallow well ground water supply that would occasionally become undrinkable during extended dry periods.
I wouldn't buy this glacier water on a bet, but on the other hand, the smart money is behind the notion that old water=good water, new water=bad water. And they are selling it.