"Sir John Howard" <sirjhoward@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:dae2ed43-3b85-4c8b-bacc-e3fe0fdab7f3@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> lynx wrote:
>
>> EVERYONE should read this..!
>>
>> "Melbourne's water supply is suffering from a combination of drought
and
>> a failure to build new storage facilities over the past 23 years when
>> the population has increased by over 30 per cent. Inactivity in
>> commissioning or even searching for new supply, founded upon an
>> ideologically optimistic predisposition in favour of demand restraint,
>> has resulted in the state's urban water shortages." - Alan Moran,
>> Institute of Public Affairs.
>>
>> Damned to bucket back by Labor's green folly
>> Article from: Herald Sun
>> Andrew Bolt
>>
>> March 19, 2008
>>
>> HERE'S a new study to make you even more cross, as you slop buckets of
>> bath water out to your parched garden.
>>
>> You know these city bans that make putting sprinklers on your roses a
>> crime? You know these restrictions that have you toting water like a
>> Third World coolie?
>>
>> Completely unnecessary. Inflicted on you purely for ideological
reasons.
>>
>> What's more, the same politicians who designed this shortage now want
to
>> give us a desalination plant that will produce water six times more
>> expensive than the water they'd get if they dropped their ban on a dam.
>>
>> Madness, and the new study that explains all this is Water Supply
>> Options for Melbourne, by the Institute of Public Affairs' Alan Moran,
>> who has checked why we're so short of water and what it will cost to
get
>> more.
>>
>> In making his calculations Moran has done what Melbourne Water and the
>> Government won't: compare the cost of dam water with the cost of the
>> Government's alternatives.
>>
>> But first he explores why we're running out of water in the first
place,
>> and notes that the state's don't-blame-us Labor Government blames it in
>> part on "global warming".
>>
>> In fact, the real reason our ovals are barren and gardens dead is more
>> unforgivable: lousy government.
>>
>> "Melbourne's water supply is suffering from a combination of drought
and
>> a failure to build new storage facilities over the past 23 years when
>> the population has increased by over 30 per cent," says Moran.
>>
>> Of course, any half-competent government would have figured that more
>> people required more water, but ours got the green faith and could no
>> longer think straight.
>>
>> Even though Victoria gets more rain than most countries, with big
>> Gippsland rivers last year suffering repeated floods, the Government
>> decided to ban any new dams to "save" the rivers.
>>
>> And until last year, it thought it could get by just with hair-****rt
>> green policies - making people simply use less water, no matter the
pain.
>>
>> Result: not enough water. Says Moran: "Inactivity in commissioning or
>> even searching for new supply, founded upon an ideologically optimistic
>> predisposition in favour of demand restraint, has resulted in the
>> state's urban water shortages."
>>
>> I'll translate: your water shortage was caused by bad politicians, not
>> bad weather. Remember that with every bucket you drag to your dying
>> plants.
>>
>> Of course, that ban on new dams could be lifted today by Premier John
>> Brumby, and there are plenty of places a new dam could quickly be
built.
>>
>> As Moran notes: "Water is available in quantities far in excess of
those
>> required for urban use from the catchments to the northeast of
Melbourne
>> and channelled through the basins of the Thomson-Macalister, Latrobe
and
>> Mitchell."
>>
>> On his figures, a new dam is so cheap - $1 billion, Melbourne Water
once
>> conceded - that it's a no-brainer.
>>
>> Taking construction, operating and transmission costs into account,
>> Moran says a new dam on the Thomson/Macalister rivers would produce as
>> much water each year as the Government's planned $3.1 billion
>> desalination plant, but at less than a sixth of the price - 47 cents
per
>> kilolitre to $3.01.
>>
>> A dam on the Mitchell - which I've backed - would give us a third more
>> water still, at just 55 cents a kilolitre. Of course, Moran's figures
>> may not be exact, but they're all we have: this Government won't allow
>> its experts to produce or release any of its own.
>>
>> You might still wonder why any government would ban a dam and insist on
>> a desalinating plant so much more expensive. But green politics is
>> irrational - as the Government's other Band-Aid plans prove.
>>
>> There's its plan to plug water waste by Goulburn irrigators and then
>> pipe its share of the "saved" water to Melbourne -- a pipe dream that
>> will produce water at $1.66 a kilolitre, three times the cost of dam
>> water.
>>
>> And there's its ludicrous "green" policy to bribe Melburnians with
>> rebates into installing rainwater tanks.
>>
>> A 2004 study for Victoria's Sustainable Energy Authority warned that
>> these tanks just weren't worth the cost, but the Government wouldn't
>> listen.
>>
>> It instead made it compulsory to install a tank or a solar hot water
>> system in new houses, adding $2500 to the cost of an average new home.
>>
>> A study for the National Water Commission has since confirmed tank
water
>> costs up to 15 times dam water, which just shows the green faith leads
>> not only to brown gardens but red ink.
>>
>> What folly. A government first causes a water shortage, then "fixes" it
>> by making you pay six times more for your water than you need to.
>>
>> Think of it each time you're forced into your garden at dawn to
>> hand-water plants you're banned from watering with your sprinklers.
>> Think of it as you lug buckets from your bath to your wilting vegies.
>>
>> Think of the politicians who force you to slave for their green faith.
>> And pray they see the dam light.
>
> Its exactly the same problem in all the other labour states, Pete. I
> tell you, labour are so useless they won't get off their useless arses
> and do a damn thing!
They certainly are. The Greens are even worse when it comes to dams.
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