Smithtown reader calls for fresh look at water storage design

On the other end of the weather scale we even had a massive fish kill in the mighty Macleay several years ago when the flood gates were opened on the Belmore and deoxygenated water from the swamps flowed downstream. However the flood mitigation system worked, so all was well.

The moral indignation, gnashing of teeth and outrage sparked by the recent fish kills around Menindee Lakes, with most of the blame directed towards the cotton industry water allocations, miss the main point.

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There is no good reason why water, which would otherwise in normal seasons flow into the ocean, should not be sold to farmers. As anyone who has toured through the regions would be aware, the problem lies with the ridiculous design of the water storage dams.

In these areas, where evaporation rates are two to three times higher than precipitation rates and evaporation is directly proportional to surface area, the impoundments are vast and very shallow and the worst possible design for water preservation.

Of course they were cheap to build with only scrapers required for construction. As a minimum, and this should be made retrospective, all irrigation storage dams should be narrow width and deep with a polypropylene liner and if this means that rock has to be drilled, blasted and removed - so be it.

As well, in the higher evaporation regions, insulating small plastic balls should be floated to cover the surface. This is done elsewhere so why not in Oz?

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