The Drought

[Abundance]

"And what was the last directly government funded long-term engineering project? Snowy River Scheme?"(Alisso) Agree with you there but I'm not sure we need to start damning the Gordon and Franklin rivers (although I'm sure your not suggesting that in particular Alisso).

It seems that this and previous governments are all too happy for the individual to bare the cost of recycling grey water and other initiatives but wouldn't it be more cost effective for some central infrastructure to recycle water and other environmentally sound initiatives. At the risk of sounding totally left wing and socialist (not that that is necessarily a bad thing) this country is being encouraged to think of the common good but leadership is allowing the cost of the initiatives to be born by the individual. Take energy for example, I pay an extra loading to help fund and use green sourced energy, in effect I am paying more to be environmentally aware. You would think that as a corporation it would be a corporate responsibility to provide green energy and not pass the responsibility off to the consumer and you would think that the government would reward these corporations for being more environmentally aware.

If however water was to be recycled and put back into damns I think the main obstacle in this matter is trust, do we trust the government enough to recycle our water to a safe level. Although I am very keen on this I do remember that at times when it rained heavily and there was some flooding, untreated sewerage would flow into the rivers or lake. The scientists can proove that the water is safe to drink but overall the issue is trust and perhaps if we were to recycle water we need to have more than adequate quality assurance methods and mechanisms in place. This latest incident where the water tasted funny because of algael bi products in a different water source, why wasn't it detected instead of finding out when people were drinking it, then having to solve the problem with more filtering. How much should we trust?

[Mythor]

Originally Posted by Abundance

do we trust the government enough to recycle our water to a safe level

You're already trusting them to treat the water to make it safe for drinking.

It would be in the Governments best interests to ensure the system is as safe as possible because if it isn't they're the ones who have to foot the bill, both in refitting the recycling plant or altering the safety protocols, as well as paying for the hospital and/or doctor time involved with treating anyone affected.

Personally I wouldn't drink water out of the tap that hasn't been at least filtered or boiled anyway anymore. Neither is a high cost proposition and both are likely to make the water much safer to drink, regardless of just how pure the water is that they pump into the pipes.

[Spoofy]

Originally Posted by Abundance

How goes it with you, especially you South Australians who I have since learned are drinking what we flush down, that would account for the severe skin condition that a fellow from SA had.

Abundance, as a SA person I can assure you, that we do not use recycled water for drinking..... and maybe the fellow you know, just has a medical condition, or eats too much junk!...


If they were to recycle the water, I would be happy to put it on my garden (I already use shower/bath/washing machine water on them), but there is no way in hell I would drink it...EVER!!

[susanjacobs]

Originally Posted by Alisso

Apparently - and I only heard an English guy on the radio mention this, so my source is highly unsupported - English school children are taught that every drop of water they drink has been through at least seven different sets of kidneys before they get it

When I was in Grade 5 in a small town in Alabama, my science teacher said, "The water you drink is the water I flushed down my toilet." EWWWW!

(Side note: I told my mother what teacher said and asked her if it was true. Her response was something along the lines of "Yes, but for other people. We have a septic tank.")

I have no problem at all about drinking recycled water. Apparently, I have done so almost my entire life.