Fire And Water

Wake Up Sydney - Life Is Only Going To Get Thirstier ... Since Sydney was first settled its residents have overexploited and befouled one water supply after another, expanding the city's reach to the point that pressure is now on to flood another massive valley, this time Welcome Reef, on the Shoalhaven River. ... In the next few weeks a specially appointed Government panel will present the Premier, Bob Carr, with advice on how Sydney can reuse and better use its water. The panel's deputy chairman, Clean-Up Australia's founder, Ian Kiernan, says bluntly that calls for a new dam are "bullshit". ... FROM next month, developers will be required to design homes to be 40 per cent more water efficient. They can score points towards obtaining building approval by landscaping with native plants instead of lawn. As landscaping accounts for nearly a third of household water use, there is even a suburb-by-suburb list of best natives to use.

Gotta love that Aussie straight talk. It will be interesting to see how well the city deals with the problem. Given my interests, one of my first thoughts was to wonder what effect water-saving landscaping would have on fire safety. It's something I'll need to look into. Doing research on fire makes it easy to lose sight of the other values people are trying to balance when they make decisions about their property.