Don't hold your breath Country Girl.

There aren't enough votes out in the country any longer and since the Country Party changed their name to the National Party you can see where their preferences lie.

New water sources being debated by governments to deal with increasing demands are centralised options operated ny utilities and they all come at high cost to the community, so the oppositions currently being expressed from different groups having opposing views is therefore not surprising. These include those persons who philosophically oppose being forced to drink recycled sewage regardless of what so-called public opinion is saying (including myself), those who believe the high costs for the centralised options would be better spent on decentralised options and those who are concerned about environmental impacts.
Water conservation by decentralised solutions (such as use of rainater tanks & greywater for gardens or toilets) will not increase the volume of water supply we have access to but it will reduce the demand on existing supplies. Ultimately, water conservation and identification of new water sources both will play an intergral part in helping to solve the future water shortage issues faced.
Our political leaders are briefed primarily by advisers operating from the centralised water solution perspective via major water utilities with clout to be heard, whereas advocates of the decentralised water solutions are individuals and have trouble being heard other than through these forums.
Success of decentralised solutions to give water savings is dependant on householders taking action which is easier said than done, and likewise its success is dependant on suitable government commitment and regulatory frameworks being in place so it may be readily adapted by householders. For example: in regard to domestic greywater reuse several Australian states have attempted to encourage domestic greywater reuse by giving generous cash rebates to help householders install greywater systems but have not removed red-tape regulatory frameworks that have effectively handicapped any potential for uptake by householders unless that householder was particularly tenacious. Fortunately, some state regulators are starting to think outside the square but much still needs to be rectified in SA, Qld & WA.

But I ask: "why bother?"

Anyway I've just placed my order for some shares in Bunnings. Is the water tank/pump/plumbing going to be the 21st century equivalent of the 70's V8 and the 90's shed? All these blokey types standing around at suburban bar-be-ques boasting about the size of their apparatus.

Look, I think Pat's solutions are probably cute and sexy for those who want to splash around in used water before changing the oil in their cars. But I'm just not interested. And then there are the growing millions who live twenty or more feet in the air in places called home units or, if you're an estate agent, apartments.

Because of the current drought(s) and probably climate change we, the population, don't have sufficient security of supply of potable water. As a response governments the nation over, aided and abetted by 'conservationsts', have suggested that it's now our (as in the householders) problem instead of admitting a failure of public policy and getting on to rectify the problem. They say, 'all you suburbanites go out and spend several thousand dollars (each) on tanks, and re-cycling systems'. But if we add up the capital cost of thousands of these individual systems the suggested de-sal plants offering a continuous supply begin to look cheap, as do public infrastructure projects which use economies of scale to collect and recycle water.

I'm happy for home hobbyists to have their systems (and water too) but I'd really prefer that pollies stop passing the muck.

Most of the solutions offered to fix Sydney's water crisis suffer from the usual disadvantages. The ideal solution should:

1. Not cost any more money.

2. Employ as few people as possible.

3. Provide other fringe benefits.

My solution is first to stabilise Sydney's population, as more people are going to use more water. You do this by issuing a permit to reside in Sydney to all current inhabitants, which can then be traded on the Stock Exchange. Once current residents have been issued permits, no further ones will be issued. If someone wants to move to Sydney, they must buy the right from someone who is leaving.

The residence permit would be made effective by making posession of it mandatory to buy land, work, register cars, rent property for more than 30 days, etc. Singapore has a similar system to limit the number of cars on its roads.

The second thing to do is to downgrade the quality of water supplied through the current reticulation system to greywater standard. The addition of a tannin coloured dye would be useful to remind people not to drink the water. This would be accompanied by the provision by the water authority of free bottles of drinking water through supermarkets. This would kill the commercial bottled water industry and save many people a lot of money. Just as in Adelaide, people could also choose to drink the rainwater from their tanks if they have one.

With a stabilised population and a ready supply of water, the people of Sydney could look forward to the 21st century on a sustainable basis.

I think you may be overestimating tank size and cost, VK3AUU. 40 inches is 1000mm of rain and 23 squares is 230m2 of roof which comes to 230Kl of runoff. My understanding is that Melbourne's rainfall is fairly evenly distributed with slightly more in winter. So they could get by with a 13,500L tank at much lower cost.

I agree with Country Gal, this is all self inflicted. We have a political structure that was only ever going to concentrate wealth, jobs and people in a single large metropolis in each state. People like John Dunmore Lang warned of this back in the 1860's when he campaigned for three colonies in Queensland. But as each new colony gained its independence from NSW the political interests in the new capitals did all they could to stiffle new state formation.

And now the urban elites spend all their time complaining about the scale, complexity and cost of their infrastructure problems but still do absolutely nothing towards meaningful decentralisation.

This is highlighted by our clown of a Premier in Queensland who is quite willing to build dams on the Tully for supplying southern needs but had already vetoed the same dam when it was proposed for the needs of the local community.

I actually have water tanks on my houses in the country but don't have one on my Brisbane house because it would only help these turkeys who created the problem in the first place. I actually like using mains water because it makes their job harder. Thats a lot of satisfaction for 95 cents a tonne.

“And now the urban elites spend all their time complaining about the scale, complexity and cost of their infrastructure problems but still do absolutely nothing towards meaningful decentralisation.”

Perseus, don’t you mean; ‘…..but do absolutely nothing towards stopping the scale and complexity from ever-increasing’?

Decentralisation without an overall plan to limit the scale of human activities is not the answer. It might alleviate pressure in some areas for a while, but it will certainly just spread the problems around if it is conducted to any significant extent outside of a national sustainability strategy.

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The whole notion of wasting pure water on uses that don’t need it to be pure is flawed. Yes we can recycle greywater to some extent. But surely the key is to have a pure water supply that is sufficient for all uses for the entire populace, under which we don’t have to worry about such things as greywater recycling.

We have had this in past decades. But of course now we don’t due first and foremost to the rapid and massive increase in the number of consumers drawing from the same supplies, with a distant second causal factor being the decline in rainfall.

Gross mismanagement has led to this situation, not an unforeseen drop in precipitation. So what do our various governments at all levels do? Address anything and everything except the number one factor!!

The gross mismanagement continues unabated.

I repeat from my last post;

‘For goodness sake, all those that are concerned with our water crisis simply MUST put a large portion of their energies into stabilizing the overall scale of activities….’, so that we can at least have a chance of achieving genuine sustainability and the maintenance of a half-decent quality of life and social cohesion.’