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 have 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.
The Long Wait for a New Water Treatment Plant
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. Despite the state and federal governments announcing $26 million for a replacement 18 months ago, construction has yet to begin.
Mark Nuttall from the Cherbourg Regional Aboriginal & Islander Community Controlled Health Service noted that it was not only bacteria in the water supply making residents sick. Locals have also been consuming excessive amounts of soft drinks to avoid the town water, leading to other health issues.
“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.
A spokesperson for Water Minister Ann Leahy stated that the design of the new water treatment plant is nearly complete and will soon go to tender, with construction expected to begin early this year and the plant due to be operational by the end of the year.
Turning to Emerging Technology
In the face of these challenges, Cherbourg has turned to emerging technology capable of extracting clean water from air. Atmospheric water generation (AWG) uses a dehumidifier to capture moisture, which 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 report that children are 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. According to the World Health Organisation,
2.2 billion people lack access to safely managed drinking water globally.
The Promises and Limitations of AWG
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 stated that he and his team are in discussions with companies seeking to use it in remote communities in Australia and overseas. However, he noted that AWG has limitations and cannot completely replace a conventional water supply due to the significant power required to heat moisture into vapour. The cost of powering AWG systems is typically reduced using solar energy.
Despite these challenges, research assistant Xiaojun Ren expressed optimism about recent advances in AWG technology.
“I think it will be a really, really helpful technology with these efforts from all around the world,” he said.
The situation in Cherbourg highlights the urgent need for both immediate and long-term solutions to water security in vulnerable communities. As construction on the new water treatment plant is set to begin, the community remains hopeful that these advancements will soon bring an end to their ongoing water crisis.
