Ultraviolet light hey.
So what if the people who drink the water get cancer.
I suppose you can then send in your guantee by post to the council and they will send out a doctor.

wrt asked about redistributing treated water to industry.
A complete set of additional pipelines ?
A very very expensive operation. So expensive as to be financially impossible.
Also as sewage all seems to end up at lower levels, simply because they are gravity systems usually, the treated water is at the lower level and would have to be pumpted uphill, another very expensive exercise.
All in all its pushing you know what uphill, literally !

Ericc, there are very limited areas of queensland that don't have a use, in their area, for all the water available, in the area.
You may be worried that Toowoomba people will not want to pay for the infrastructure to bring water from somewhere else.
I am worried about the damage caused to that "somewhere else".
Once their water is gone to Toowoomba, the economic opportunity that water offered, is gone.
Will Toowoomba, or Brisbane for that matter, want to pay the "somewhere else" for that lost opportunity, or is this another example of how the bush shares with the city. If the city want it, we must give it up.

Farmers on the Logan river have had applications for irrigation licenses on hold for 6 years, while the Logan basin water resources plan was developed. Now it is out, with the discovery of unallocated water in the system. Great, now they can get those licenses.
Like hell, that water is bound for Brisbane. Did you ever REALY think we'd let you waste it out here in the bush growing crops? Its much more use in Brisbane, on a bl**dy football field.

I thank the posts above for answering some of my simple questions about recycled water- from what I underrstand having now researched the matter a little further, there is very little research that actually confirms long term exposure to recyled water is without risks. NASA itself has stated this is one of the big question marks about sustaining life in outer space.

However do we have a choice? Running out of water isnt like running out of milk. I cant understand the constant economic rationalisation in this debate given the fact water is not a luxury. The costs associated with piping and pumping are extreme- but what about the costs associated with trucking water if we run out (and fuel costs continues to rise!).

It would be my proposal that we start investing in new sets of pipes, rain water tanks become mandatory, desalination plants become operative, recyled water is pumped into power stations etc and we all stop saying 'its too hard'. While economics do dictate the order of the day, we may all just have to come to terms with the fact there is no choice.

All Toowoomba has to do is shift all further housing and commercial development into the water catchment. This will lift the yield from each hectare of developed land from 5% to 50% of rainfall and also deliver an inflow into the existing dam from even minor falls.

Nothing improves catchment yield like roof tops, pavement and sealed roads. But I suppose after months of ridiculing the people who had the nerve to suspect that there may be unknown problems with drinking sewerage, the same people will claim the cost of bringing storm runoff to drinking standard is too much.

There are loads of alternate water solutions but they are pretty hard to see if you have your head in the paper bag of another agenda.

For inland cities such as Toowoomba the solutions are very difficult and expensive. Coastal cities and towns do have a doable alternative to recycling in desalination but not cheap. No solution anywhere is going to be cheap.
My suggestion is for water desalination plants big enough to do the job if running say half the time. The only valid objection I have seen to desalination plants is the power requirement, greenhouse gases etc.
My solution is to add enough wind generators to supply the desalination plant via the grid.
When the wind blows the plant runs, when the wind stops the plant stops.
Now this is all expensive but it is a hell of a lot cheaper than moving people out of Sydney, Brisbane etc, which is the only other viable alternative.
All this will need to be done before peak oil arrives on the scene in perhaps the next ten years. After that the economy will be too stretched to be able to invest in such large infrastructure projects.