Traveston Crossing Dam

Discussion in 'The big picture' started by arawajo, Apr 9, 2007.

  1. arawajo

    arawajo Junior Member

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    The Queensland government wants to dam the Mary River at Traveston Crossing. The river is home to various endangered species that will be further threatened if this dam goes ahead. Scientists world wide are speaking out against this dam. Many people doubt that it would ever provide the amount of water needed for the South East of Queensland where the populatin is exploding. To find out more please visit https://www.savethemaryriver.com
    Thanks,
    arawajo.
     
  2. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    g'day arawajo,

    aptly named the travesty dam, not well supported by many that i am aware of, but as for stopping the charging bull gov' that's another story, they are using the fear emotion of no water for us to drink to muster support in the s/east masses who have their collective heads buried in some sports program on tv. the dam is far too shallow and evaporation and soakage will be major problems as well.

    but anyway those others should look a bit wider in the field as water and power go hand in hand, the gov' as i see it currently needs to have water storages for fresh water for those so called clean power stations you know the ones? well again the way i see it there is likely to be around 6 or 7 of these dangerous units in the south east of troppo state. and as the little g-nome has said "so what if you have one of these stations in your backyard - they are safe, and he goes on to say he wouldn't mind living next door to one" as if!!

    my thoughts 2 on the gold coast 2 on the sunshine coast 2 out west of brissy in the ipswich environ, and if 7 one north of gympie toward the new northern end of the sunshine coast, hence traveston.

    len
     
  3. arawajo

    arawajo Junior Member

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    Today the senate inquiry is being held in Gympie, join me in wishing the participants well. The electronic media has been banned from the venue for some reason. I wonder who doesn't want the world to see?
     
  4. Jim Bob

    Jim Bob Junior Member

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    From the ABC,
    Water tanks no replacement for Traveston dam: Bligh

    The Queensland Government says rainwater tanks could never replace the Traveston Crossing dam near Gympie.

    An independent study commissioned by three environment groups has found tanks are more cost-effective and energy-efficient than desalination plants or dams.

    The Australian Conservation Council [sic - it's actually "Foundation", not "Council"] says instead of funding the Traveston Crossing dam, the State Government could give every south-east Queensland home a tank and still have money left over.

    But Infrastructure Minister Anna Bligh says that is not the plan.

    "For backyard water tanks to replace the water that will be available from the Traveston Crossing dam, we would require every single household, including apartments in Brisbane and the south-east corner to have a 5,000 litre water tank," she said.

    "Water tanks are a very important part of our strategy, but they will just never replace a dam the size of Traveston Crossing."


    A 5,000 litre tank, for those who've never had a water tank, it sounds pretty huge. But in fact it could be a cylinder 1.8m wide and tall. It's also the one the ACF study assumes for the purposes of their study.

    Mentioned on the ACF website as follows,

    Rainwater tanks a viable urban water solution

    Date: 16-Apr-2007

    A new study shows rainwater tanks are a cost-effective solution to the urban water problems plaguing Melbourne, Sydney and South-East Queensland.

    The report – prepared by economists Marsden Jacobs Associates for the Australian Conservation Foundation, Environment Victoria and the Nature Conservation Council of NSW – found the widespread installation of rainwater tanks in Australian capital cities would mean big savings in water, energy and money.

    The study found:

    Rainwater tanks are cost competitive with dams and desalination plants.

    Rainwater tanks are five times more energy efficient than desalination plants and twice as energy efficient as the proposed Traveston dam, per megalitre of water produced.

    If governments deployed rainwater tanks to 5 per cent of households each year in Sydney and South-East Queensland, dams and desalination plants planned for 2010 could be delayed past 2026 (Sydney) and 2019 (SEQ).

    Most Australian houses are suitable for a rainwater tank. In Sydney 65 per cent (or 1.1 million houses), in SEQ 73 per cent (or 900 000 houses) and in Melbourne 72 per cent of existing houses have potential for a rainwater tank.

    “While 38 per cent of households in Adelaide have rainwater tanks, fewer than 6 per cent of the houses in Melbourne, Sydney, South-East Queensland and Perth do,” said ACF’s urban water campaigner Kate Noble.

    “Rainwater tanks collect and store water far more efficiently than dams, especially in times of drought. As the climate changes we should be installing tanks to take advantage of the rain that does fall on our rooftops.

    “If governments systematically installed rainwater tanks in Australia’s major cities, we would secure as much water as the planned Kurnell desalination plant in Sydney, the Tugan desalination plant on the Gold Coast and the stage one of the unpopular Traveston Dam proposed for Queensland’s Mary River,” Ms Noble said.

    Full report available here.

    Note the difference between the ACF report, and the Minister's response. The ACF report specifically looked out for which percentage of households could have a water tank - ie, not small apartments - and factored that into the report. But the Minister responded that small apartments couldn't have water tanks (in fact they can be ut on the roof, but let's pretend that 7,000 years of building homes with cisterns on the roofs never happened). So the Minister was responding to something which wasn't in the report.

    It'd be like having a study that police should have more cars, so they can respond to incidents more quickly, and the report says, "of course cars won't get them off-road, but they should get motorbikes, too", and some Minister responds, "Can't work! What about off-road?" As always, actually reading something you're responding to helps your response make more sense.

    Governments just like Big Projects. One big dam, power station, highway, etc, looks more impressive than lots of small rainwater tanks, solar panels, or pedestrian walkways. Which is more effective, cheaper, creates more jobs, etc, is irrelevant.
     
  5. murray

    murray Junior Member

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    i saw a report that suggested that people with rainwater tanks who stay on mains water actually become more wasteful of mains water for various crazy reasons.
     
  6. Jim Bob

    Jim Bob Junior Member

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    I can believe that. I think that's easily-solved with water metering.

    If you supply your own tank, then you get to use the water from that as you see fit. If the water company or the government supplies the tank, then they get to meter the water you use from it. They supplied the means of collecting the water, they get to charge you for that supply. The only difference between a big dam and a rainwater tank is where it is, if the government or water company's paying for it.

    The same could apply to solar panels, wind mills and so on. I don't have to pay individually for the building of the ten metre stretch of road in front of my home, and then get to use it for free - I just pay my rates, and they build and maintain it as normal. If it works for roads, streetlights and so on, why not for water and power?
     
  7. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    i think they would be more likely to waste their rain water first, some are that silly.

    we manage all water as we want our tank to supply what we want when we want it, so those with little tanks (hardly worth the rebate) will now ahve a long dry winter to go through up here, that will be there first lesson when they realis that although they ahve a rain water tank it takes rain to fill it and when there is no rain gardens and worse lawns take a lot of water. so the way we see it managing all your water is paramount, that includes grey and we water. people are not prepared to put themselves out or be a bit inconvenienced to conserve water properly. we get more than enough water out of a few 44gallon plastic drums to do all our washing with, why can't others do that also? because it's inconvenient they can't simply push a button and walk away.

    with the tanks for homes deal there again only if they make a minmum size tank say 15,000 litres, and for those who can't/don't want to make space for a tank that will realy make a difference then i guess they dip out. if people have to give up some under house parking or garden for a tank then that surely should be 1st priority? i know some who won't put a large tank in though they have the space on 3/4 acre blocks because they don't want to pull up a rose or pansy garden to do it. but any way we are only gum flapping as it is all about control and profits.

    every one has not looked around their districts there are so many opportunities for schools, halls, churches and various other businesses to have tanks it isn't funny. there is one school near us that put 2 piffling little 3k litre tanks on the end of a large shed that could easily fill one 25,000 litre tank if not 2.

    remember there is no transparency from the gov' over water, what you see on the media is what they want you to see.

    and travesty is all about nuclear power.

    that's how len reads it.

    len
     
  8. Jim Bob

    Jim Bob Junior Member

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    I dunno, I reckon a 5,000 litre tank might do the trick.

    Old Brisvegas gets the following as average rainfall,

    [​IMG]

    1,380mm in all.

    I've not bee able to find month-by-month figures for 2006, but Brisbane Times tells us that they managed 66mm a month on average, or 792mm for the year. The BOM tells us Brisvegas got 795.6mm for the year.

    Okay, normal variation for the area is that September's the lowest-rainfall month (65mm), and March the highest (150mm), with an average of 96mm for the year. So if these 66mm average months are giving us the same range of variation, then the worst month gave Brisvegas about 42mm.

    That means 1.3 litres of water fell on each square metre of roof in Brisbane, each day in their driest month. Since you get some evaouration and splashy run-off and dodgy gutters, you'll manage to keep at most 1.2 litres of that, let's be pessimistic and call it 1 litre. Your average three-bedroom home is 220m2. So they'll collect 220 litres per day. Now, I dunno about up in Banana-Bender Land, but down in Sydney the UNSW tells us that the average "detached dwelling" - which is, on average, a three bedroom house of 220m2 with three people in it - uses 309,000 litres of water a year, or 840lt a day.

    So a 5,000 litre water tank, in the driest month in Brissy in 2006, with that average 3-bedroom 220m2 three-person home, would take 22 days to fill up, but only 6 days to empty. So the water tanks could only supply about a quarter of the domestic demand.

    Incidentally, to provide enough water, they'd need 5mm a day, or 1,825 mm.

    So what Len says about how much they're using is right, I reckon. SE water tells us that a unit like ours uses annually 220kl, while we in fact use 66kl. We don't do anything amazing for water conservation. Our top-loading washing machine is rated 1 star out of 5 for water consumption, using 121l per maxi wash. We have four minute showers, and a full bath once a week. Our loo policy is if it's yellow let it mellow, if it's brown flush it down. Bath and shower water goes to the garden, which is garden beds of 10m2 - that's 40l a day that goes to them. Sometimes the bath water goes to the washing machine, but only when we're washing coloureds, not whites or sheets. Yet we manage 1/4 average. If we can do it, so can those Brisvegans.

    Then their 840lt a day consumption will become 210lt a day, and the 220lt a day rainfall in their DRIEST month in a year of DROUGHT will still be plenty for them.

    You Brisvegans just need to get 5,000lt water tanks, and, as my sergeant-major said to me during Recruit Course, "get your shit together in a sock and wire it tight." We're not talking about shit here, but water, but then - it's Brisbane drinking water, so the two are not quite so far apart.
     
  9. arawajo

    arawajo Junior Member

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    We have compost toilets in the bathroom and the ensuite at our place. I can't understand why more people don't have them.
    Visitors are mostly very impressed with the composting toilets which have no odour look like any other toilet and are simple to manage.
    We throw scraps down the toilet and add pine shavings and end up with great compost that the trees thrive on.
    I can't see any reason why the government can't get behind the idea of compost toilets in the suburbs. Imagine the water savings?
    Tanks, front loadering washing machines and compost toilets- that's my dream for the future.
    Let The Mary Flow.
     
  10. gardenlen

    gardenlen Group for banned users

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    g'day jim,

    my experience says not and for the money the more water is going to be better to manage and a better margine for the "no rain" periods.

    that graph must have come from one of our better rain seasons (as my reading show we are missing out with a big short fall to what the graph says) it is nothing like that at present, i compare daily rainfalls each day and at this stage i either get a tad more than does brisvegas or the same. now they ahve 2 readings one in brissy somewhere? (the somewhere being the lynch pin) and the brissy airport. so which oine do they compile the graph from as the airport commonly gets more rain that does the other station?

    as i try to tell people going for a sea change be carefull using rainfall averages as provided by the bom.

    rain falls in in corridors it does not fall generally all over the place, and some are in areas where they get more chances of rain that others but bom aren't reading those areas, you need to try and work a mean average over a shorter time period say 2 years. some suburbs are a whole lot drier than others by significant ammounts a drive around will show that.

    some months on the graph may be close indicators but you won't know which ones until you commit to relying on those figures just as an eg.,.

    jan they say 140mm my actual 138
    feb " " 147app my actual 155
    mar 148app 107
    apr 138app currently 3mm

    your rain guage is all you can rely on, if you are going to store water for self reliance practises then you need some safety margine or you could be sitting there for a long time with your tank doing nothing for you. with averages you need to know how many rain days were involved a rain day is any day that reicieve .2mm or more. last june and july had 10 & 9 days respectfully august had 3.

    just some experiential data to throw into the think tank, there's that word again.

    len
     
  11. heuristics

    heuristics Junior Member

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    Len you are right about your comments on nuclear.
    From what I understood from the debate on the desalination plant for Sydney that was had before the election and forgotten about....
    company like Bechtel and Kellogg Root Brown would be tendering to build the desal.. the same companies that have profitted so handsomely as contractors to the US military in the Iraq war.

    These companies LOVE big projects - its about control - look at Enron controlling power plants across the US... watch Enron - smartest guys in the Room to see what having all that control delivered them - they were able to pull the power out of California at will and make a motza on the stockmarket because they KNEW when the power would go down, so they could speculate.

    If we ahve our own rain tanks and learn to budget our water and electricity use via solar and wind panels - they loe control.
     
  12. Alex M

    Alex M Junior Member

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    Another very good reason for putting rainwater tanks on all urban buildings, as I see it, is to reduce urban flooding. Some areas of Sydney, for instance, have flooded as a result of short but intense rain storms, and I wonder if the flooding would have been nearly as serious if tanks had been in place to absorb at least some of the run-off.

    Tanks would be a cost effective way of easing, if not solving two problems, water shortage and urban flooding. :idea:
     
  13. murray

    murray Junior Member

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    i think anyone with an ounce of intelligence would agree that water tanks are great - necessary even - but they're obviously only part of the solution.
     
  14. heuristics

    heuristics Junior Member

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    Co-incidentally I was cogitating on why the govt has rejected the idea of providing water tanks today as I flicked thru the local paper and saw a advert feature of local mechanics who do the LPG conversion - you know, with the $2000 Fed Govt rebate to install the tanks on cars.

    If the govt can subsidise LPG tanks for (in theory) every car in Australia - why is providing a water tank a ridiculous or "too expensive" exercise?

    Having grown up on tank water with no town water - it taught good water saving discipline at a young age.
     
  15. Alex M

    Alex M Junior Member

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    You're right Murray, it doesn't take a big brain to see that water tanks are a good idea, but we're dealing with politicians here.

    One reason little Johnny is subsidising LPG in vehicles, could be that he is increasing fuel excise from July 1, 2008, and every year after, until 2012, meaning there'll be no advantage in using it.

    Rigoursly Applied Stupidity, again.
     
  16. heuristics

    heuristics Junior Member

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    Alex M- so that's the reason for the LPG conversion subsidy.

    I knew there HAD to be a reason!
     

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