Page 1437 - Week 04 - Thursday, 26 March 2009
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The government will continue to keep the Assembly and the community informed and up to date on the development of these new infrastructure projects along with demand management measures to maintain and improve the ACT’s water security. I can assure the community that the government is continuing to work to ensure the security of our water supply for the ACT and region and the effective management of that supply. It is one of the government’s highest and most fundamental responsibilities and one which the ACT Labor government is deeply committed to.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (3.25): The Greens would like to take the opportunity to respond to the minister’s statement today on water security in the ACT and his announcement yesterday to give approval to proceed with the building of a pipeline to transfer water from the Murrumbidgee River to the Googong Dam and the purchase of water from New South Wales to be stored in the Tantangara Dam and then transferred to the Googong Reservoir via the pipeline. The government has made this announcement as a response to growing water security issues in the ACT. The Greens would like to firstly acknowledge that in the consideration of large infrastructure projects for water security that is probably the better option for the government to pursue at this stage. It avoids the building of a new dam and has the added benefit of potentially adding environmental flows to the upper Murrumbidgee, something that can only be welcomed.
However, we would seek to remind members and the Canberra community that this should not be seen as a solution to our water woes. And in no way should we think for one minute that we can relax our actions on other water saving efforts. I make this point for two key reasons, and I think that the minister’s statement today concurs with these points. Firstly, it is clear to all of us that rainfall patterns in south-east Australia are changing and rainfall into catchments is diminishing. While it is often difficult to make a direct link to climate change and specific impacts, those of us who do not spend our days denying the science of climate change are clear in our own minds that we are seeing a fundamental shift in our rainfall patterns.
Those who are still denying the signs of climate change perhaps should take a look around. The figures on our average rainfall and stream inflows are sobering, to say the least. We are bottoming out on the worst-case scenarios predicted by the CSIRO. The minister has today spoken of an average 75 per cent reduction in the inflows, down to less than 50 gigalitres per year from a long-term average of 200 gigalitres. These are very sobering figures and they point to how serious an issue we are facing here. We have a long-term problem in our region that means that water management must be a permanent feature of public policy. We need to take long-term approaches to building a city that needs less water.
Secondly, even with these measures and with projected population growth in the region, we know that in a reasonably short space of time we will be facing water challenges again. The two options of extending the size of the Cotter Dam and building the Angle Crossing to Googong pipeline are estimated to deliver us water security until around 2023. That is a significant investment by Canberra’s water consumers for what is, in the grand scheme of things, a relatively short amount of time.
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