Aidan,
I think productive use of steel would warrant government investment in modern steel milling for local and export supply. Eg. my car is a 1986 imported Japanese parts model and still has the original exhaust system. Australian steel exhaust lasts about 5 years. Also, I understand steel legs under Bass Strait oil rigs are made of Japanese steel because Australian made steel does not last as long.
Whatever the process, better quality steel is needed, especially now for high speed rail coupled with aqueduct.

I am not talking about pipelines. Comprehend my words. I am talking about aqueduct. Aqueduct does not handle sharp turns either. And I reiterate, no pumping would be required. In fact small hydro power plants may be possible.

Greenie ‘ignorance’?
Ocean ecosystems are continuing to be devastated and destroyed without green news comment.
Marine Protected Areas do not stop sewage and land use nutrient overload pollution, nutrient overload that over 30 years independent investigative general research shows is the fundamental cause of algae that is smothering seagrass and coral and causing dead zones.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/02/100305-baltic-sea-algae-dead-zones-water/

Overfishing is not the actual problem, the problem is too much nutrition, too much nutrient, nutrient overload, nutrient pollution. That’s why 30 years of fishing restrictions have fundamentally failed to rehabilitate fish populations generally.
Marine animals eat plastic because they are starving, nothing else in the vicinity to eat. Numerous scientists suspect that. I have a case of evidence to prove it beyond reasonable doubt.

No to my living in the past. The evidence is clear.
Recent sewage ‘treatment’ rolls off lumps and filters some particles, condoms, nappies, tomato seeds and even the occasional diamond ring.
Subsequently outfall water clarity is improved but the nutrient loading bonded to the water remains and flows UNMANAGED down rivers into coastal ocean surface currents that flow into estuary ecosystems including GBR coral/lagoon waters.
Fresher water tends to the surface and is drawn and pushed by tides and winds, including long distance.

I am very cautious. Aqueduct plus rail could generate viability.

And thank you, Aidan, for your conversation. Please don’t hesitate to continue.

JFAus: Central and southern Qld is not cyclone prone as is the north. Wind and rain wiping out crops is obviously a handicap.

Actually Cyclones are not really a problem. They get one every very few years where-as Southern Queensland suffers from very severe Storm Cells which come through every few week in season.

JFAus: Getting water out is possible using aqueduct, not pipes, not by pumping.

They use a combination of Creeks, Aqueducts, Artesian Pumping & Pipes to ferry water around the Burdekin. The Water level around the Burdekin is about 10 Metres. The Water comes, originally from West Papua & takes 10 million years to get there. Actually most of that underground water comes up inside the Great Barrier Reef. If you travel by Yacht inside the GBR there are places you can drink fresh water straight out of the Ocean. You know when you have run into fresh water, your Yacht will drop about a foot. (Valency) That water could be tapped easily.

rechub: the entitlement brigade would whinge so loud that they would get a subsidized ticket, for which the high end would also have to subsidise.

Agreed. Oh, I have a QRail Pass for Life, 26 years in the Railways will get you that. Not that I ever use it, about twice a year on the Brisbane Suburban lines, if that.

JF Aus,

Australian steel mills tend to specialise in high strength steel. We could make the very corrosion resistant steel ourselves if we wanted to, but it would probably be hopelessly uneconomic because there's so little domestic demand.

Open channel aqueducts do have one advantage over pipelines: their smaller hydraulic radius makes them slightly more efficient. However this is usually outweighed by the considerable disadvantages of more evaporation loss and the need for a route that's downhill all the way. That's the hard part. Fortunately tight curves aren't a great problem (though they do adversely affect efficiency).

Aqueduct requirements are totally different to high speed rail requirements, where tight curves must be avoided but gradients are much less of a problem than for heavy haul rail.

Baltic sea hypoxia is a common occurrence, and has been for over a century. Though the 2010 dead zones were a serious problem, there was no need for Greenies to cause a great fuss, as the surrounding countries had already agreed to, and were implementing, a plan to reduce Baltic nutrient loading.

Overfishing is one of the actual problems, and it affects much greater areas than nutrient overload does.. And fish don't just eat plastic because they're starving, but because it's there!

Modern sewage treatment's multi stage, and treatment systems that deal with the nutrients are available and in common use.

There are places Australia needs more railways. There are also places in Australia that need more water, and there may be some of them where aqueducts could do the job better than pipelines. But that's unrelated to the railways, and not suited to using rail alignments.

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rehctub, Sydney and Melbourne both have populations over 4 million and are rapidly increasing. There's already over thirteen million people in the Brisbane-Sydney-Canberra–Melbourne corridor, and growth potential's very high.

Although our VFT route wouldn't serve anywhere near as many people as the Tokaido Shinkansen, it seems to compare pretty well with the Hokkaido Shinkansen which is currently under construction.

Constructing a VFT would make more work available, so more people would pay the bills.

Jayb,

The more cyclones and storms the better.

I doubt it takes 10 million years for water to come underground from PNG.
What keeps going in must comes out.
I have heard of PNG water at Mullumbimby or Murwillumbah.
Anyway it needs pumping up from ground level or sea level.

And I consider a yacht would sink an inch or two but not a foot, but maybe you are correct.

Good to see you have been with the railways 25 years.
I appreciate your experience.

Aidan,

Domestic demand can sometimes be generated. Railways previously built economies of nations and can stimulate economies - surely.

Downhill all the way from the Gregory Range to the Coorong in SA is possible, the Murray Darling catchment already runs to SA from central Queensland.

I consider downhill from Gregory Range can be achieved by following contour’s of the Great Dividing Range, dropping half-a-spirit-level-bubble along the way.
Use Google earth to assess Gregory Range elevation and the elevation at central southern Queensland.
The fall is easily possible, far more compared to the Darling from Qld to SA.

Think the other way around, think whether aqueduct could possibly suit high speed rail alignment and elevated construction.
Anyway conventional rail could follow contours as it often does already.
Inland rail freight from NQ to Melbourne would be very beneficial there and back, if there is water for new towns and agriculture and employment along the way.
Not all water need go down the Darling River.

Also, it’s not beyond realms of possibility to float cargo down the aqueduct and truck empty containers back. Not high speed though. LOL.

Aidan you are dealing with fire on ocean issues.
I first reported world fish devastation occurring in 1982 and that was followed by EEZ law and aquaculture policy.

Now I am dealing with solutions that include whole-of water-ecosystem-management involving aqueduct and perhaps heavy inland rail to carry produce including the other way to Asia.

It is protein deficiency malnutrition among seafood dependent Pacific island friends that is driving me. Has been since 1982.
On international Womens Day 2016, I heard of 5,000 dead babies and 1,500 dead women per year from maternal mortality in PNG, that I submit is linked at least in part to protein deficiency malnutrition (not starvation).
It's all worsening, unchecked.
What have you heard from greenies about local fish availability or not for island people?

For 6 months of the year I live in Solomon Sea, Pacific Islands waters.

Continued when Post Limit allows…………………..

JF and JB,

Where did you get the idea that any water travels under the sea from Papua to mainland Queensland? AIUI Queensland's rainfall is what fills all its rivers and its section of the Great Artesian Basin, apart form the small amount that flows in from NSW and the NT.