Opinion: Brutal truth about the future of our water security

True water security can and will only be arrived at by enforcement of genuine water conservation steps, writes David Topp.

Wivenhoe Dam in flood in 2022

Fifty cent fares and free school lunches: The largesse is coming thick and fast from our incumbent government as October 26 approaches.

Seemingly nothing is off the table, bar egg timers for every household to time our showers, 2007 style.

Of course 2007 was the year when this city’s primary water storage, Wivenhoe Dam, fell to a miserly 15.08 per cent, mandating an exhortation from then premier Peter Beattie to the populace to take all possible water conservation steps.

This imperative did not last long, thankfully.

Rains returned, and less than four years later dam overtopping rather than running dry became the worst-case scenario.

Although this city’s flood events provide overhead images as spectacular as the trauma is caused at ground level, droughts, and concomitant plunges in water storage levels are the genuine default for South East Queensland – which may explain the LNP Opposition’s “Watertight water security plan for Queensland’s future”.

How then to get there? The proposed dams and weirs mentioned were not located within the broader Brisbane River catchment.

Indeed, the former Newman LNP government could only conceive of two new dam locations within; one on Warrill Creek southwest of Ipswich and one at Linville, in the catchment’s far north.

Neither was pursued by the Palaszczuk Labor government. That Warrill Creek transits land earmarked for the Inland Rail project infers an obvious hurdle.

As would the opportunity cost of arable farming land being sacrificed or alternatively being unable to be devoted to Queensland’s other major public policy dilemma at present: homing those shut-out by high cost housing.

A Linville dam would store a mere 15 per cent of the broader catchment, leaving the remaining 85 per cent at the mercy of the rains.

The first quarter of the 21st century has proven the inability of our dams to guarantee both drought and flood proofing.

This means that true water security can and will only be arrived at by enforcement of genuine water conservation steps, like banning all domestic garden and lawn waterings other than via private tanks.

As difficult a sell as this such concept may be at any time, candidates from all sides of the spectrum need to step up and grasp this nettle, as our collective future depends on it.

David Topp is a barrister and author of two books on Brisbane River floods

Originally published as Opinion: Brutal truth about the future of our water security