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Water
The Water Campaign
The City of Perth is a member of the Water Campaign – an international program to reduce water consumption and improve local water quality. The Water Campaign is an ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability program (see link at right), supported by the Department of Water (see link at right) in Western Australia.
On 27 January 2004 the Council endorsed the City of Perth’s participation in the Water Campaign. Since joining the Water Campaign the City has been formally recognised as having completed the following Water Campaign milestones:-
- Milestone 1: Calculation of total water consumption in the City’s corporate operations and services, and calculation of total water use in the community
- Milestone 2 Corporate:
- Establishment a 20% reduction target for water consumed in the City’s operations and services
- Establishment of a target to improve the City’s impact on local water quality, through our corporate operations and services, by achieving 55 points of corporate water quality actions by 2011/12 - Milestone 3 Corporate: The development of a Corporate Water Strategy that outlines an action plan on how to achieve the goals set out by Milestone 2.
- Milestone 4 Corporate: The implementation of the actions outlined in Corporate Water Strategy and to reach 20% of the targets.
The City is currently progressing with the Water Campaign Milestone 5 Corporate: The re-inventory of water consumption and quality and review of progress towards the targets.
Scheme Water used by the City of Perth – Sector breakdown
In 2007/2008 the City of Perth used 111,942kL of scheme water in our corporate operations and services.
The City has reduced its use of scheme water by 31%, from the 2001/2002 baseline of 166,537kL. This has been achieved through a range of water efficiency measures, and by converting from scheme to groundwater for the irrigation of a number of open spaces, parks and gardens.
The City’s actions to reduce water consumption and improve local water quality include:
- the redevelopment of Point Fraser, a stretch of the Swan River foreshore, to include a wetland to treat stormwater from the urban catchment, and vegetated swales to infiltrate and treat local stormwater runoff (see link at right)
- the installation of dual flush toilets and water saving shower heads, and trial of waterless urinals in Council House, the City’s administration building
- the implementation of metering and monthly monitoring of the City’s use of groundwater via our bores, and
- the planting of waterwise vegetation and the implementation of an automated irrigation system replacing the use of overhead water canons to reduce our use of groundwater for irrigation in Ozone Reserve.
Scheme Water used by our Community
As a whole, our community uses 5,254,707kL of scheme water. In addition, there are numerous garden bores within the City of Perth, and their water consumption is not metered.
Water restrictions
Western Australia now has rostered watering days for use of garden sprinklers. Both scheme water and bore water users must adhere to rosters. On your rostered watering days you may water only once, before 9am or after 6pm.
To find out your rostered watering days see the Water Corporation website (see link at right).
Waterwise Councils Program
The City of Perth was awarded as one of the first Waterwise Councils on 3 June 2009. This program is run by the Water Corporation and the Department of Water, with assistance from the ICLEI Water Campaign.
This program assists the City to adhere to the Governments water efficiency measures, and implement measures to improve water management principles.
To achieve this status the City has completed a number of requirements such as:
- Participating in the ICLEI Water Campaign™, achieving Milestones 1 to 3;
- Ensuring that appropriate staff members attend a waterwise training course on water-wise gardening and irrigation and on internal auditing;
- Completing a water conservation plan and submitting it to the Department of Water;
- Ensuring no prosecutions for breaching any abstraction limit set by the Department of Water; and
- Demonstrating substantial progress within 18 months towards the implementation of water management actions.
In order to maintain its Waterwise status the City has included a number of actions into the Corporate Water Strategy that will ensure constant improvement in water efficiency and quality.
How to save water
Average winter rainfall in the South West of W.A. has dropped 15% over the 30 years since 1976. As a result of the dramatic decrease in available water we must, as a community, learn to reduce our water use.
Information on saving water in your home, garden, or businesses can be found on the Water Corporation website (see link at right).