{"id":14906,"date":"2025-04-01T12:16:22","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T11:16:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/isleutilities.com\/?post_type=executive-exchange&#038;p=14906"},"modified":"2025-11-21T16:43:58","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T15:43:58","slug":"ep-7","status":"publish","type":"executive-exchange","link":"https:\/\/isleutilities.com\/it\/executive-exchange\/ep-7\/","title":{"rendered":"Ep 7: Tackling water security in Australia: coast-to-coast"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>From Dams to Desal to Food Bowls: What Coast-to-Coast Australia Teaches Us About Water Security<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Executive Exchange \u2014 Episode feature with Dr. Steve Capewell, Managing Director, Goulburn Valley Water<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In this episode of the Exec Exchange, Dr. Piers Clark talks with <strong>Dr. Steve Capewell<\/strong>, Managing Director at <strong>Goulburn Valley Water (GVW)<\/strong> in Victoria, Australia. It\u2019s a story that runs from the west coast to the east coast, from empty dams to fertile valleys \u2014 and it lands on a message the global water sector can\u2019t afford to ignore:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Climate change won\u2019t hit every region the same way. If your risk models assume it will, you\u2019ve already got a problem.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Steve\u2019s career has given him a front-row seat to two very different versions of water insecurity \u2014 and two very different strategic responses.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Chapter 1: When the Rain Just\u2026 Stops<\/h3>\n<p>Steve started his water career at <strong>Societ\u00e0 dell'acqua<\/strong> in Western Australia in 2002, after working in an alumina refinery and becoming fascinated with water circuits in industrial processes.<\/p>\n<p>Water Corporation is no small outfit: a <strong>single utility serving the entire state of Western Australia<\/strong>, covering some <strong>2.5 million km\u00b2<\/strong>. In the early 2000s, Perth experienced what can only be described as a brutal wake-up call: the <strong>rainfall-runoff into the city\u2019s dams effectively collapsed<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The old planning logic \u2014 \u201cit rains in winter, we store it, and we\u2019re fine through summer\u201d \u2014 simply stopped working.<\/p>\n<p>That forced one of the boldest shifts in urban water history:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The decision to <strong>fast-track large-scale seawater desalination<\/strong> as a <strong>climate-independent source<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>At the time, this meant building what was then the <strong>largest seawater desalination plant in the Southern Hemisphere<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Steve was deeply involved \u2014 initially on the technical side, then as a member and eventually <strong>chair of the alliance board<\/strong> overseeing the plant\u2019s performance in partnership with Suez.<\/p>\n<p>The result? Perth avoided becoming a \u201cbrown city\u201d and instead became a <strong>global reference point for manufactured water as a core part of water security<\/strong>, not just an emergency backup.<\/p>\n<p>And then they did it again.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A second, even larger <strong>100 GL\/year<\/strong> seawater desalination plant was built further down the coast with a Spanish consortium.<\/li>\n<li>Together, the plants created a <strong>150 GL\/year<\/strong> climate-independent backbone for Perth\u2019s supply.<\/li>\n<li>A third large desal plant is now underway for the northern suburbs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Desalination wasn\u2019t the only lever. Water Corporation also:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Ran an early trial of <strong>indirect potable reuse (IPR)<\/strong> \u2013 purified recycled water for aquifer recharge.<\/li>\n<li>Negotiated performance criteria with the health regulator before formal guidelines existed.<\/li>\n<li>Commissioned a <strong>14 GL\/year<\/strong> purified recycled water plant, later expanded to <strong>28 GL\/year<\/strong> \u2014 still the only operational-scale PRW scheme of its kind in Australia.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The lesson from the west coast is clear: when <strong>quantity collapses<\/strong>, you need <strong>manufactured water<\/strong> and a <strong>balanced portfolio of sources<\/strong>. You don\u2019t get to debate it forever.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Chapter 2: When Your Problem Isn\u2019t Quantity, It\u2019s Quality<\/h3>\n<p>Fast forward to late 2020. In the middle of a pandemic, Steve moves 2,800 km across the country to take up the role of <strong>Managing Director at Goulburn Valley Water<\/strong> in regional Victoria.<\/p>\n<p>Structurally, it\u2019s a different world:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>GVW is <strong>one of 18 water corporations<\/strong> in the state, rather than a single statewide utility.<\/li>\n<li>It covers <strong>25,000 km\u00b2<\/strong>, serves <strong>54 towns<\/strong> and a population of around <strong>135,000 people<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>And it sits in the heart of Victoria\u2019s <strong>\u201cfood bowl\u201d<\/strong>:\n<ul>\n<li>Around <strong>50% of the state\u2019s fruit<\/strong> is produced in the region.<\/li>\n<li>Roughly <strong>a quarter of all milk produced in Australia<\/strong> comes from there.<\/li>\n<li>The regional economy is valued at around <strong>AU$3.5 billion per year<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In other words, GVW isn\u2019t just keeping taps running. It\u2019s a <strong>critical enabler of a globally relevant food supply chain<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Unlike Perth, Goulburn Valley\u2019s <strong>raw water sources are, for now, relatively plentiful and secure<\/strong>. The region is tied into the enormous <strong>Murray\u2013Darling system<\/strong>, and its key river networks look reasonably resilient in terms of <strong>volume<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>But that doesn\u2019t mean the region is safe.<\/p>\n<p>Steve\u2019s assessment is blunt:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>In Goulburn Valley, water security risk is far more likely to arrive via <strong>deteriorating water quality<\/strong>, not a loss of quantity.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Drivers include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Changing <strong>land use<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Urbanisation<\/strong> and associated stormwater<\/li>\n<li>Broader <strong>land management practices<\/strong> across the catchment<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And, crucially, these are <strong>outside the direct control<\/strong> of the utility. GVW doesn\u2019t dictate land use; it has to live with the consequences.<\/p>\n<p>As any process engineer knows, you can <strong>theoretically treat almost anything<\/strong>. But in practice:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>More contaminants mean <strong>more treatment barriers<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>More barriers mean <strong>higher operational complexity and cost<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>For a utility that must operate <strong>24\/7 with high reliability<\/strong> \u2014 especially in a region that underpins food exports \u2014 there is a hard limit to how far you can push \u201cjust add another barrier\u201d before it becomes unsustainable.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Building a Different Kind of Portfolio<\/h3>\n<p>So what do you do when your risk is quality degradation rather than hydrological failure?<\/p>\n<p>GVW is now:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Assessing scheme resilience one by one<\/strong>, understanding where vulnerabilities lie.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Augmenting existing systems<\/strong> where necessary to buy resilience.<\/li>\n<li>Expanding <strong>non-potable recycling<\/strong> to take pressure off potable sources in some towns.<\/li>\n<li>Actively studying where <strong>advanced treatment<\/strong> and even <strong>desalination for drinking water<\/strong> could become part of the long-term mix \u2014 even in an inland, apparently well-supplied region.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The logic is the same as in Perth, but the trigger is different:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In Perth, the drivers were <strong>hard and visible<\/strong>: dams stopped yielding, and the city faced a very real risk of running out of water.<\/li>\n<li>In Goulburn Valley, the threat is more <strong>gradual and insidious<\/strong>: a slow drift in source water quality that could silently push treatment into the realm of the technically possible but economically insane.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For water leaders elsewhere, the question practically writes itself:<br \/>\nAre you planning only for <strong>volume risk<\/strong>, or are you genuinely stress-testing your system against <strong>long-term quality risk<\/strong>as land use and climate evolve?<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>People, Not Just Plants<\/h3>\n<p>You\u2019d expect a metallurgical and chemical engineer with a PhD and a track record in big desal projects to finish with a hymn to infrastructure.<\/p>\n<p>He doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>Asked what advice he\u2019d give a younger version of himself, Steve doesn\u2019t talk about membranes, alliances or portfolio theory. He talks about <strong>people<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Looking back at those landmark projects in Perth, it would have been easy to get lost in:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Technology choices<\/li>\n<li>Asset performance<\/li>\n<li>Commercial structures<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But what actually delivered water security were:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Talented teams<\/strong>, assembled across organisations<\/li>\n<li>Strong <strong>partnerships<\/strong> with the private sector<\/li>\n<li>Effective <strong>communication<\/strong> with regulators and communities<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>His view is that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>We won\u2019t \u201cbuild\u201d our way out of climate change with assets alone.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>We\u2019ll need to design and operate complex systems with <strong>capability, culture and collaboration<\/strong> at the centre.<\/li>\n<li>If you want water security in 20 years, you need to be <strong>growing and nurturing your people now<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>What This Means for Water Leaders<\/h3>\n<p>Taken together, Steve\u2019s coast-to-coast experience leaves the sector with some uncomfortable but necessary questions:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Are your planning models still assuming the <strong>past hydrology<\/strong> is a decent guide to the future?<\/li>\n<li>Do you have a <strong>balanced portfolio of sources<\/strong> \u2014 including manufactured water \u2014 or are you gambling on dams and luck?<\/li>\n<li>Are you treating <strong>water quality risk<\/strong> with the same seriousness as <strong>quantity risk<\/strong>?<\/li>\n<li>And are you investing as much thought into <strong>people and partnerships<\/strong> as you are into concrete and control systems?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If the answer to any of those is \u201cnot really\u201d, you know where to start.<\/p>\n<p>To hear the full conversation with <strong>Dr. Steve Capewell<\/strong> and explore these themes in more depth, listen to this episode of the <strong>Exec Exchange<\/strong>.<\/p>","protected":false},"featured_media":14899,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"class_list":["post-14906","executive-exchange","type-executive-exchange","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Ep 7: Tackling water security in Australia: coast-to-coast | Isle Utilities<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/isleutilities.com\/it\/executive-exchange\/ep-7\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"it_IT\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ep 7: Tackling water security in Australia: coast-to-coast | Isle Utilities\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"From Dams to Desal to Food Bowls: What Coast-to-Coast Australia Teaches Us About Water Security Executive Exchange \u2014 Episode feature with Dr. Steve Capewell, Managing Director, Goulburn Valley Water In this episode of the Exec Exchange, Dr. Piers Clark talks with Dr. Steve Capewell, Managing Director at Goulburn Valley Water (GVW) in Victoria, Australia. 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