19 February 2008

The Director of Victoria University's Institute for Sustainability and Innovation, Professor Stephen Gray, has welcomed $1,000,000 funding over five years from the Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment to establish the Werribee Centre for Sustainable Water Use. VU has committed $3,600,000 to the project.

With 2007 being Victoria's hottest year on record and this January being the hottest Australia wide, meteorology experts are warning that Australia may never fully recover from the current decade-long drought that is largely due to climate change. The challenge for the new Centre is to conserve the dwindling water supply of the Western Plains region of Victoria.

Professor Gray said: "Our vision is a research centre which focuses on new technology and process development, and seeks to provide the Werribee plains region with 'fit-for purpose water' (water appropriate for specific industry needs)."

"The Centre will look at the water needs of the Werribee irrigation district and of industry, and look for re-use and recycling solutions which are particularly tailored to water sustainability issues in the region."

"One of the challenges is to recover, reuse and minimise the 170 billion litres a year of low salt waste water now flowing into Port Phillip Bay from the Western Treatment Plant."

"This water will then be used in the region and provide a substitute for water currently being used from our over stressed streams and river systems providing a greater security for future water needs."

The Centre will also collaborate with local industry to encourage water efficiency and set up links with water sustainability centres of excellence, industry and water authorities.

Research will focus on:

• Cleaner production technologies for surrounding industry trade waste water.
• Improving the efficiency of desalination, membrane technologies and other processes that remove total dissolved solids (TDS), total suspended solids (TSS) and other biological organisms from waste water.
• Substituting drinkable water with recycled 'fit-for-purpose' water.
• Creating a centre of excellence in sustainable water use at Werribee as a resource for industry and the community.

Professor Stephen Gray is available for interview
Ph: (03) 9919 8097, mobile: 0434 605 847

Photos available of: The Hon Tim Holding, MP, Victorian Minister for Water operating a reverse osmosis machine to produce re-cycled fit for purpose water, at the funding announcement.


Media Contact: Ms Christine White, Media Manager,
Marketing & Communications Department, Victoria University
Ph: (03) 9919 4322; mobile: 0434 602 884