Keeping his family healthy and hydrated is one of Samuel Little’s greatest challenges. The father-of-five spends about $20 a week on bottled water, but his children are still regularly forced to miss school due to sickness caused by the town water in Cherbourg, an Aboriginal community three hours north-west of Brisbane. The afflictions include skin rashes and diarrhoea.
“Every six months or so, there’s a bug going around the house,” Mr. Little said. “Even getting to school to have that basic education becomes a struggle due to their health concerns.”
For much of the past month, Cherbourg residents had to boil water before being able to drink it or use it for baby formula. Torrential rain carrying bacteria-laden topsoil from surrounding farms and septic tanks washed into the narrow creek that serves as the community’s water supply. Cherbourg’s 65-year-old water treatment plant was overwhelmed, causing dirty, unfiltered water to flow directly into the kitchen sinks and bathtubs of the town’s 1,500 residents.
Historical Challenges and Delays
Most Australians would be unfamiliar with having to boil water, but in Cherbourg, it has been a regular occurrence for at least three years. The water treatment plant was built when the community was still a government-controlled Aboriginal reserve. Construction on a replacement still has not begun, despite the state and federal governments having announced $26 million for it 18 months ago.
According to Mark Nuttall of the Cherbourg Regional Aboriginal & Islander Community Controlled Health Service, it is not only bacteria in the water supply making residents sick. Locals have also been drinking too much soft drink to avoid consuming town water, he said. Dr. Nuttall treats patients of all ages each day for gastrointestinal problems and diabetes linked to poor water quality, including babies fed with formula made from contaminated water.
“We should not [have to] go to this kind of extreme level when we ask for something,” said Chatur Zala, CEO of Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council.
While most councils rely on property rates to fund infrastructure upgrades, Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council does not receive any rates because it owns most properties in the town. It took three years of more frequent boil water notices before the state government approved requests for a new treatment plant.
Innovative Solutions: Atmospheric Water Generation
The situation is so desperate that Cherbourg has turned to emerging technology capable of extracting clean water from air. Atmospheric water generation (AWG) uses a dehumidifier to capture moisture. That vapour is then cooled into a liquid state, filtered, and dispensed as drinking water from a cooler. More than 20 coolers have been installed in Cherbourg, including at the health clinic, daycare centre, high school, aged care home, and council office.
Gundoo Daycare chair Elvie Sandow and director Rhianon Insch-Watkins noted that children were experiencing significantly fewer gastro and flu-like symptoms since the new AWG coolers arrived. Australian researchers are at the forefront of efforts to adopt AWG technology to tackle global water challenges. Globally, 2.2 billion people lack access to safely managed drinking water, according to the World Health Organisation.
Research and Limitations
University of New South Wales (UNSW) researchers have developed a new material for atmospheric water generation. The new material—a combination of graphene oxide and calcium—absorbs about eight times more water than silica gel, commonly used in clothing desiccants. Professor Rakesh Joshi said he and his team were in discussions with companies seeking to use it in remote communities in Australia and overseas.
“I think it will be a really, really helpful technology with these efforts from all around the world,” said research assistant Xiaojun Ren.
However, AWG has limitations, and Professor Joshi noted it could not completely replace a conventional water supply. Heating moisture into vapour requires a significant amount of power, with the cost of powering AWG systems typically reduced using solar energy. Nevertheless, recent advances in AWG technology are encouraging.
As Cherbourg awaits the construction of its new water treatment plant, the community’s reliance on innovative solutions like AWG underscores both the urgency of their situation and the potential for technology to provide interim relief. The design of the new water treatment plant is nearly complete, and construction is expected to begin early this year, with the plant due to be operational by the end of the year.
