Desal deadline

By Melissa Grant
JUST weeks remain for Cardinia township residents to convince key players in the Wonthaggi desalination plant project to move a booster pump station.
Members of the small rural community are outraged at State Government plans to build the station about 500 metres from Cardinia Primary School, despite contrary advice.
A decision about the booster pump’s location could now be in the hands of companies bidding to build it, after Planning Minister Justin Madden rejected the Environmental Effects Statement (EES) panel’s recommendation to move it.
Cardinia resident Catherine Manning, Cardinia Primary School principal Alan Armstrong and a local horse trainer last week met Eastern Victoria MP Johan Scheffer and an adviser to Mr Madden
Mrs Manning said that although the meeting didn’t shed any light on the community’s concerns, it established that she now would have to meet Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) officers and Water Minister Tim Holding to resolve the issue.
She said she hoped the meeting would allow her to speak with companies bidding for the project – who may ultimately decide the booster pump station’s location.
Mrs Manning said some people felt let down by the way the State Government had handled the issue.
“If you still have that power to reject what your panel recommends it does make people think, what’s the point?” she said.
“Because the minister can still say no, it questions the whole process.”
According to the EES, the booster pump station is required to provide additional pressure in the pipeline to deliver the required flow of treated water to Cardinia Reservoir.
It will be housed in a building about 94 metres long, 12 metres wide and seven metres high and built in a two-and-a-half-hectare paddock near the town centre.
Ms Manning said the location was unsuitable.
“There are many places where industrial infrastructure has to go, but with the booster station it doesn’t have to go in that spot,” she said.