Canberra's water authority is considering supplementing the city's drinking water supply with purified treated sewage water by the end of 2040. Icon Water modelling suggests the utilities company will need to introduce another water source to the system to keep up with increased pressure from a growing population and climate change. The company is also considering other options like recycled water for non-drinking purposes, greater demand management, augmented dams, and additional river pumping.
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00:00For some, the idea of turning what goes down when you flush into what comes out of your
00:07taps is hard to swallow.
00:09No, no, no, no thank you, I don't, no, it's disgusting.
00:13Don't think about it.
00:14Look at the amount of food that we eat in restaurants, have you seen anything prepared?
00:17Really wouldn't bother me at all, because I believe that the science and the treatment
00:20would be sufficient that it would be clean.
00:23Purified, recycled waste water is on the table as an option for bolstering Canberra's drinking
00:28water reserves.
00:30That involves a multi-step process that is used to treat and purify the water before
00:35it meets stringent standards for drinking water supply.
00:39Other options being considered for Canberra include using recycled water for non-drinking
00:43purposes like watering sports grounds, expanding the capacity of the region's dams and additional
00:49pumping from rivers to meet the demand of a growing population.
00:53What our modelling tells us is that we need to introduce our next water source to the
00:58system somewhere around 2035 to 2040.
01:02There's an environmental imperative too, with researchers finding the Murrumbidgee River's
01:07median average flow to southwest New South Wales reduced by 55% in the three decades
01:13from 1988, in small part due to Canberra drawing drinking water.
01:19I think too often people think rivers are like a magic pudding, you just go back and
01:23get more water from them.
01:24Despite the damage, he says there is hope.
01:27It's never too late and I think Murrumbidgee's still got a fair bit of water going down it.
01:32We've got to think of better ways of managing it.
01:33Even though we had a smaller population 40 years ago, we were actually drawing more than
01:38we are now.
01:39So the other side of water security is obviously demand management and we continue to encourage
01:45Canberrans to use water wisely.
01:48Icon Water thinks they'll need to make a decision about a new water source by 2027.
01:54Harry Frost, ABC News, Canberra.