Other Sources of Water
Harvesting stormwater
Depending on rainfall, there can be up to 500 billion litres of stormwater running off pavements and roads across Melbourne. Understandably, people want to know why we can't do something with this water.
Many households and business already capture stormwater from rooftops using water tanks, and this is increasing over time.
Recent investigations show that it's harder and very expensive to do this on a scale big enough to make inroads into Melbourne's 240 billion litre deficit by 2012. There are also water quality issues - stormwater can often carry a large amount of pollution picked up from roads and pavements, which limits how it can then be used.
A pipe from Tasmania
There have been some suggestions that Melbourne should build a pipeline to bring water from Tasmania.
There are a lot of practical barriers to this idea. Building a 480km pipe from the north of Tasmania, under Bass Strait, to Melbourne would likely cost more than $7 billion. A lengthy environmental effects study would need to be completed and approved. It would also require the agreement of the Tasmanian Government on behalf of their community.
Unlike alternatives like the desalination plant, this idea is dependent on rainfall at a time when climate conditions are changing rapidly.
The cost of water
Melbourne's water bills are among the cheapest of any Australian city and our water use is among the lowest.
We support the Victorian Government's commitment that retail water bills will no more than double between 2008 and 2012/13. This increase will help pay for the $4.9 billion in major water supply projects - the Sugarloaf Pipeline, desalination plant and reconnection of Tarago Reservoir.
Some economists suggest that increasing the price of a limited resource helps to limit demand for it. In other words, we'd all use less water if it cost more. However, there's plenty of evidence to suggest that the community already sees water as a precious resource.