Water Sustainability In Southwest Australia

Water Sustainability in Southwest Australia

One of my high school instructors once told me that a human being could survive for over a week without food but only a couple of days without water.   This statement signifies the immeasurable importance of freshwater to the human race as well as other living things.

Potable water in the South West of Western Australia has become scarcer and more precious than ever before due to the region’s increasingly drier climate combined with it’s rapid growth of its industrial sectors: agriculture, mining, urban and residential, industry and recreation.   To identify the problems and solutions of the water shortage, each of the five industrial sectors must be reviewed involving what makes up each sector, their water usage and waste, and the strategies implemented to enhance their water use efficiency.

The Gov’t of Western Australia (2003) predicts that total water use in Western Australia will increase [by 95%] from 1,791 GL/year in 2000 to 3,500 GL/year by 2020. In response to the current water shortage, The Water Corporation has implemented many different reforms and strategies under its Security through Diversity scheme to ensure long-term security of Western Australia’s water supply.   Each possessing their own pros and cons, the reforms and strategies include: more efficient use of existing water supplies within each industrial sector, the reforestation of dam catchments, the construction of desalinization plants, the initiation of a trading program with agricultural irrigation cooperatives, research into the possibility of tapping into the Yarragadee aquifer as a main water source, and a trial wastewater treatment program.

Table 1: Water use by industry sector in Western Australia
Water Use Sector Water Use (GL/yr) Percent
Agriculture 767 43
Mining 419 24
Urban and Residential 320 18
Industry 207 11
Recreation 78 4
Total 1791 100
Table 1: Water use by each industry sector in Western Australia in 2000...