Cleaner water at a fraction of the price
A young Australian scientist has come up with a new method that cuts millions of dollars off the cost of fighting contaminated drinking water.
Dr Fiona Dyer's new technique relies on pinpointing areas in a reservoir's catchment that are most likely to lead to contamination problems, so that early intervention can reduce the need for expensive chemical treatment later on.
Melbourne Water, which has adopted the method, believes it will save the organisation $5 million.
The research focused on one of the reservoir's supplying drinking water to Melbourne. The Tarago reservoir, in the south-western Gippsland area of Victoria, had experienced an algal bloom caused by excess phosphorous carried in soil sediments washed into the reservoir.
"To treat the problem at the catchment rather than the chemical level, we needed to identify the dominant sources of sediment and associated phosphorous," said Dr Dyer from the Cooperative Research Centre for Catchment Hydrology.
Using a technique that focuses on the concentration of particular elements such as aluminium and silica in the soil, Dr Dyer was able to "fingerprint" the soils from suspect areas in the catchment and see if these were also found in the reservoir.
It turned out the culprit soils came from just a few basalt areas in the catchment which could be managed over time to reduce the problem.
Dr Dyer, who is 29, said the research which won her the "Young Water Scientist of the Year" award this week, could be applied to any contaminants attached to sediments, including heavy metals and pesticides.
She was selected from more than 150 applicants for the award, which recognises an outstanding postgraduate researcher working within the water industry.