SA Barngarla people challenged Port Lincoln plant proposal

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The First Nations people of the Eyre Peninsula are threatening legal action against SA Water to stop the construction of a $313-million desalination plant they say will cause "insurmountable damage" to fish traps that predate colonisation.

Transcript

00:00 Dawn in Port Lincoln sees mussel farmers bringing in their catch.

00:07 Yumba mussel holdings harvest up to 40 tonnes of native blue mussels a week from the sheltered

00:13 waters of Boston and Proper Bay.

00:17 Yumba contributes to about 60% of Australia's mussel production with an annual turnover

00:22 of $20 million.

00:26 His success can be attributed to natural larvae floating in surrounding protected bays.

00:31 I moved here for one reason and that was the natural spat.

00:35 My main concern about a desalination plant that has an intake that takes up 5 gigalitres

00:41 of water per year is what they're talking initially.

00:43 A percentage of that spat will go on the intake.

00:47 What percentage?

00:48 Nobody can determine that.

00:49 He says his business is at risk from a proposed desalination plant to be built at Billy Light's

00:55 Point in Port Lincoln.

00:57 Time is running out for SA Water to provide reliable drinking water for the Ayr Peninsula.

01:04 Water supply issues were identified from the late 2000s.

01:09 Today Port Lincoln heavily relies on the Yulee South Basin for its water.

01:14 About 75% of the region's water is drawn from this underground source and that's where we're

01:20 headed to now.

01:25 Water is drawn up from the basin through these pipes and pumped back into tanks that store

01:30 water for the residents.

01:33 It's predicted the basin will be depleted next year with increased salinity already

01:38 detected in some of the production bores.

01:41 And the region's landscape board has recently announced it's urgently reviewing its water

01:45 allocation plan, which is why SA Water argues the plans for the desalination plant should

01:51 go ahead.

01:52 It would take around a year to build and if the project is delayed, it says it would have

01:58 to consider staged water restrictions.

02:01 We are seeking to build a desalination plant in order to protect the water security of

02:08 the Ayr Peninsula to ensure that the customers of today have water but also we can continue

02:14 to support the customers of the future.

02:16 A development application for the desalination plant is expected to be submitted by mid-year.

02:22 [Music]

02:24 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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