Premier of South Australia

The State Government is committing $30 million to a new pipeline project that will deliver high quality recycled water to Adelaide’s CBD – and substantially reduce harmful nutrients being released into the Gulf St Vincent.

As part of the Glenelg Reuse Scheme, the Glenelg Wastewater Treatment Plant will be expanded and a 30 kilometre pipeline network laid from the plant, past the Adelaide Airport, into the city centre and North Adelaide.

The pipeline network will deliver recycled water to:

• the Adelaide parklands
• potentially enable environmental flows down the River Torrens, and
• make available reused water for 64 commercial development opportunities in the central business district.

Announcing the funding at Glenelg today, Premier Mike Rann said the project would more than triple the annual water reuse at the Glenelg treatment plant, up to 28 percent.

“This will free up stressed ground water resources and River Murray water that is now used to water our parklands and supply commercial developments in the city.

“At the moment – and many people don’t realise this – Adelaide recycles 20 per cent of its water through our wastewater treatment plants which is the highest level of any major city in Australia.

“When all of our wastewater treatment plant upgrades are completed, at Christies Beach, Bolivar, Aldinga and Glenelg, we will be capable of recycling more than 40 per cent of Adelaide’s waste water.

“The Glenelg project alone will help us reduce the discharge of nutrients to the Gulf St Vincent by about 50 percent during the critical summer period.

“It is one of four key projects in the South Australian Government’s Water Proofing Adelaide strategy and contributes to significantly reducing the flow of nutrients into the sea.

“The total project cost is $60 million and we look forward to the Commonwealth honouring its commitment to match State funding under the National Water Initiative, made by Prime Minister John Howard during the 2004 Federal election campaign on a visit to Adelaide.”

Minister for Water Security Karlene Maywald says the new pipeline will mean 5.5 billion litres of treated water from Glenelg Wastewater Treatment Plant will be reused.

“This project contributes to the building of long term backbone infrastructure.  Once the pipeline is established, then the network can be extended to include a significant number of future property developments or other industries, landscape watering and commercial users capable of using recycled water,” she said.

“Initially, about one billion litres a year of recycled water will be supplied to the Adelaide City Council to irrigate Adelaide’s parklands. This will replace potable water currently sourced from the River Murray and Adelaide Hills catchments.

“Also, another one billion litres of water sourced from the River Torrens and groundwater supplies could be replaced with recycled water from the plant.

“This will allow for an increase in environmental flows to the algal-bloom susceptible River Torrens and there is capacity for this to be increased substantially.

“Once matching Commonwealth funding is confirmed, work can begin on the project immediately,” Minister Maywald said.

Mr Rann says the local Federal Member for Hindmarsh Steve Georganas had been lobbying particularly hard, over some years, for this State/Federal project to be given the green light.

Quick Facts:

The project offers:

• A new 30 kilometre pipeline – 10 kilometres will take water from Glenelg to the city and a further 20 kilometres of pipeline will be laid around the parklands including North Adelaide.
• An increase in the annual reuse of water from the Glenelg wastewater treatment plant from 8 per cent to 28 per cent.
• In total, with other reuse initiatives from metropolitan wastewater treatment plants, it will contribute to increasing the overall annual reuse of water from about 20 per cent to more than 40 per cent.
• A significantly reduced nutrient discharge to the gulf marine environment.
• Reduced stress on the existing irrigation water supply systems including potable (River Murray and Mt Lofty Ranges), River Torrens and the local groundwater system; and,
• A sustainable water supply for current and future irrigation of the Adelaide Parklands.