Tackling water security in Australia: coast-to-coast

Piers Clark: Welcome to the Exec Exchange, 15 minute podcast in which a leader from the water sector shares a story to inspire, educate and inform other water sector leaders from across the globe. My name's Piers Clark and today my guest is Steve Capewell from Goulburn Valley Water. Steve, thank you for joining us.

Steve Capewell: Thanks Piers, it's great to be part of this initiative.

Piers Clark: Well, uh, as you probably know, we always start with a little bit of background on our speaker and, and the beauty of you is that you have experience across a couple of water companies, uh, in Australia. Uh, so tell us a bit about your background.

Steve Capewell: Yeah, so I, uh, well, I came to my current role here as the managing director of Goulburn Valley Water in Victoria, uh, back in late 2020.

So, uh, I've touched over four years ago now, it was actually right in the middle of the pandemic. So that was a real challenge being a new managing director, um, in a water utility on the other side of the continent, because I'm originally from Perth in Western Australia. Um, so, uh, yeah, it worked through that and, uh, and I've had a wonderful time, ever since.

Piers Clark: And you'd been, you'd worked in Perth, hadn't you?

Steve Capewell: Yeah, that's right. So I'm originally from Perth, um, which for your international listeners is on the West coast of Australia, where. I'm based now on the East Coast, you know, 2, 800 kilometers away. I grew up in Perth, studied metallurgy and chemical engineering at university.

I went on to do a PhD. , first worked in, uh, in an alumina refinery, in fact, and got really interested in the water circuit there. Uh, and it's interaction with the process and then had an opportunity to go into municipal water treatment. And, uh, that's when I joined the Water Corporation in Western Australia back in 2002.

, and again, for your listeners, the Water Corporation is the, the single water utility covering the entire state of Western Australia. Some two and a half million square kilometers or about 975, 000 square miles. So very, very large. Business. And, uh, yeah, I was there for the next 18 years.

Piers Clark: Yes. I'm hoping that we can do a podcast with, uh, um, the man, the head of, uh, water corp at some point, because of course, that's a very unique water utility.

Very unique, very unique. It's a unique water utility. Um, now let's talk about Goulburn Valley then. So Goulburn Valley, it's sort of in the bread basket or maybe the fruit bowl, we should call it of Australia. Tell us a bit about where is Goulburn Valley, how big an area do you serve? What do you, what's your client base look like?

Steve Capewell: Yeah, so we're in regional Victoria. Um, it's one of 18 water corporations in this state. Um, so very different water industry structure here compared to Western Australia. Uh, operating area of about 25, 000 square kilometers, 54 towns. Um, population served about 135, 000 people. Um, but I guess the uniqueness of the Goulburn Valley is that we're positioned in the center of the food bowl of Victoria, as you've said, appears our region produces half of the state's fruit.

About a quarter of all the milk that's produced in Australia comes out of this region. Significant international exports of food and agricultural products. Um, so a regional economy in the order of three and a half billion dollars per year.

Piers Clark: So I think when we met you, you told me because I had the, the, uh, privilege of visiting you recently.

And when we met, you said something like. Almost every household in the world will at some point in the day have produce that will have come from the Goulburn Valley region, you know, fruit juice and things like that.

Steve Capewell: Yes. Yeah, I think if you look in the pantry, pretty much anywhere, you'll see something that's that's come from this region.

And I guess what it means for Goulburn Valley water is that whilst our traditional urban water sources are or services for households, Uh, sort of relatively small. it's very much about those large commercial and industrial customers that produce the food and um, therefore we are very, very integral to the ecosystem that exists in this part of Australia.

Piers Clark: Excellent. And geography wise, you're about two miles, two hours drive north of Melbourne. Now, the topic we want to talk about today is, is tackling water security coast to coast in Australia, because you've had the experiences that you've just described. And you told me a wonderful story about how. You'd had two.

I think there were 200 year events that happened almost back to back, which begs you to believe that maybe the models that said they were one in 200 year events were wrong. Um, I know you've got, you've got a bit of a structure to a story that you want to share here. So I'd like to now pass the conch to you.

I won't interrupt, um, and let you tell your story.

Steve Capewell: Yeah, I think if I sort of go back to. My time at Water Corporation back in the early 2000s, back then, and this story is very well known in the water sector globally, the rainfall runoff into the dams in Perth effectively stopped overnight in what I guess on reflection was a very abrupt and very, um, brutal manifestation of climate change.

In, uh, in Western Australia, and, uh, that triggered a very bold decision at the time, which was to fast track investment in large scale seawater desalination, as a climate independent source, just because the traditional planning, water supply planning approach of, you know, it rains in winter, You capture that in your dams and your aquifers and you can supply through summer and have a bit of carryover year on year for water security.

You know, that was just a failing strategy on account of that climate change. So, so I was lucky enough to be involved in that big gamble, that first, Seawater desalination plant, uh, that was built.

Piers Clark: Was that a world first?

Steve Capewell: It was indeed, yeah. At the time, uh, it was the largest seawater desalination plate, uh, plant in the southern hemisphere.

And, I mean, there were seawater desal plants in the Middle East. And, um, I think in 2005, Singapore PUB had commissioned , the sing sing spring desalination plans, but a very new technology for water corporation. Very big dollars, of course,

Piers Clark: um, and you were working with, um, Suez, I believe, and you were the chair of the alliance board for, for eight years, I think.

Steve Capewell: Yeah. Many years. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So I was originally, uh, part of the technical panel that was working with the proponents and then when eventually the alliance was formed with Suez. I was on the alliance board and then went on to chair the alliance board for the better part of eight years, and that was very much about the operational and commercial performance of that plant, um, which was wonderful for the state.

I mean, it essentially prevented Perth from becoming a brown city into one that was more blue and green and, climate independent water sources in Australia were born from that initiative.

Piers Clark: And, and of course you did it once, and then you repeated it.

Steve Capewell: Indeed, yeah. It wasn't, it wasn't too long after the successful commissioning of that Perth plant, that planning was accelerated for a second plant, a much larger plant.

Um, so in 2012, Uh, 100 gigalitre capacity seawater desalination plant was built a bit further down south, a bit further down the coast, um, and it was probably then that, that was the real

Piers Clark: And just to be clear, that 100 gigalitre was twice the size of the previous one, which would have already been the biggest that anyone had built, you know, so

Steve Capewell: Exactly, exactly, yeah.

So then, yeah, a total of 150 when both stages of the southern seawater desalination plant was commissioned, and Yeah, I think that's really when water security in the long term through climate independent sources or manufactured water. sort of really took hold as being the cornerstone of water security, which then the other capital cities, uh, started to follow, you know, so Sydney, Adelaide, Melbourne, Gold Coast now all have

Piers Clark: paved the way you'd cut the way through the jungle and paved the way.

Now I named check Suez, uh, which I probably shouldn't have done, but I named check Suez. Was this second one with Suez as well?

Steve Capewell: No, that was with a Spanish consortium that, uh, has undergone a couple of name changes Since, so we, uh, yeah, the first alliance with, uh, with Suez, with the French, and then the second Uh, with a, uh, group, a Spanish group and interestingly, a third alliance has, uh, has just been formed to build a third large seawater desalination plant this time in the northern suburbs of, of Perth.

And so, yeah, there's a really strong capacity there for manufactured water now in, in Western Australia.

Piers Clark: Okay. So at that stage, half of the water to Perth was being supplied through desalination. Okay. You'd set a template for climate resilient cities in, in locations like this, but you weren't done, were you?

You, you decided you wanted to do some more stuff.

Steve Capewell: Yeah, I think, uh, in the interest of a, a good balanced portfolio of source options. The Water Corporation probably as far back as about 2005 started to think about purified recycled water or indirect potable reuse and started a trial of indirect potable reuse in the northern suburbs.

Back then I was quite heavily involved in the treatment barrier performance but also negotiating with the Department of Health performance criteria because there were no drinking water, recycled water guidelines at the time to use. And, um, you know, that trial was very, very successful, led to the building of a, uh, 14 gigalitre plant for, um, injection into the aquifer, which has since doubled to 28 gigalitres.

So that is now the, uh, you know, the only, purified recycled water plant at operational scale in Australia. Um, so yeah, again, another climate independent source. from manufactured water in the interest of water security.

Piers Clark: Now, brilliant. Let's come to Goulburn Valley. And what have you, have, what have you taken from what you did in Perth and brought to Goulburn Valley?

Steve Capewell: Yeah, I think the water security challenge here for Goulburn Valley is, is, is quite different. I think unlike Perth, our raw water sources are quite plentiful, relatively secure. We're part of the enormous Murray-Darling system Yeah. Here on the east coast of Australia. Um, and there appears to be pretty good resilience in the foreseeable future for some of, uh, the smaller river networks that supply our, um, our towns.

But I guess my observations are that the threat of water security. For our region will manifest through gradual deterioration of source water quality, uh, making treatment extremely difficult and eventually cost prohibitive, as opposed to a reduction in water quantity or loss of yield. And I think that that's a result of land use changes, increased urbanization, land management practices, urban stormwater, all having an influence on water quality.

Piers Clark: That you, as Managing Director of Goldman Valley Water, you can only be responsive to, you can't actually change those, they're, they're just outside your purview, aren't they?

Steve Capewell: Absolutely. Absolutely. And, uh, you know, I know, as a chemical engineer, theoretically, you can treat just about anything. Um, but, uh, as you know, the more contaminants in your source, the greater the number of treatment barriers, the greater the cost. , and in an environment that we're in, where we need to be operational 24 hours a day, seven days a week, not fail because we're part of that integrated ecosystem of food production. I think we, we've, we've got a lot of work to do around resilience. To be able to treat those deteriorating sources and to think of ways of establishing new water sources in our context in the same vein as what we had done in Perth.

Piers Clark: And so what have you done?

Steve Capewell: Uh, well, the planning has started now, I think around, around really specifically understanding the resilience of our schemes, one by one, augmenting them where we need to, but then starting to consider where do some of these advanced water treatment processes fit In our context, whether it is additional water recycling to take the load off potable water, and we've done that in a number of towns, or potentially even desalination for drinking water supply in the long term, they are very much part of our studies at the moment to, to build an equivalent balanced portfolio of source options, where we are.

Piers Clark: Wonderful. Well, you know what? Um, necessity is the mother of, of invention is the sort of phrase. And there's a great story that you're telling here of being in a situation where the water sources just weren't there in Perth and you had to show real bold innovation. Um, the world's largest seawater desalination plant and then doubling down, taking that experience and doing it twice as big a second time around and then coming over to Goldman Valley, where actually the work you do isn't just important to the citizens of people who live in the towns in Goldman Valley, but it's also, as we said, on the fruit bowl, has an impact globally to food resources.

So, um, incredible. Um, Steve. You've still got another 15, 20 years of your career left, but what advice would you give a young Steve Capewell?

Steve Capewell: I think it's, uh, I think it would have to be don't, don't forget the people, you know, looking back, working on those, really complex, really challenging problems.

In Perth, new technology, new infrastructure, uncertainty, it was easy to get lost in the technical, to double down on the engineering and the assets and that had served us well in the past. But I think at the end of the day, those projects were characterized by the presence of fantastically talented people working together, forming partnerships, communicating well, um, yeah, ultimately achieving water security is a, you know, it's a pillar of a sustainable and prosperous city and that's achieved through people rather than assets.

And I think, uh, you know, going forwards, we're not going to build our way out of climate change. We're going to build our way out of those problems. Uh, it'll come down to people. So start growing and nurturing them now.

Piers Clark: Excellent. Steve, it has been an absolute delight talking to you. Thank you for taking the time.

Steve Capewell: Thanks, Piers.

Piers Clark: You have been listening to The Exec Exchange with Piers Clark. I have been talking to Steve Capewell, the Managing Director of Goulburn Valley Water in Australia. Please join us next time. Goodbye.