By Kirsty Ross
WERRIBEE’S Western Treatment Plant and coastal areas like Altona will be submerged and uninhabitable within decades, according to a local environment expert.
Western Region Environment Centre director Harry van Moorst said rising sea levels could devastate the area by 2030 to 2050.
“We’ve got less than five years to change our policies in order to ensure that within 10 years we’re making a real impact on our carbon emissions. If we don’t do that we run a major risk of runaway climate change or global warming,” Mr van Moorst said.
Basing his knowledge on findings of a multitude of international studies, he said the consequences would be “disastrous” if people were not careful.
“Locally there is a real risk that unless we tackle climate change effectively in the next decade, places like Altona will become uninhabitable as sea levels rise,” he said.
“And the Western Treatment Plant will no longer be able to be used for sewage treatment because it will be under water.
“The Ramsar wetlands area (home to migratory birds), which we’re so keen to protect as a major area of biodiversity, will be ruined by seawater inundation.”
Mr van Moorst said reduced rainfall and the impact on farming and transport were other wide-scale problems. “This is so serious that we really do have to see it as a potential emergency – we have to act and do something about it.”
Mr van Moorst believes the answer is in renewable energy.
“We have to turn to alternative energy sources that are renewable and not put carbon oxygen in the air.”
The Western Region Environment Centre is trying to spread community awareness and action by conducting a series of public information sessions, workshops and film evenings.
“Werribee’s a useful place to do that because we’re such a massive growth area, so developers and so on can really begin to find effective alternatives that can go with future developments, residential and commercial developments,” Mr van Moorst said.
More than 100 people attended the recent free screening of An Inconvenient Truth at the centre, and the feedback was very positive, Mr van Moorst said.
“They’re very pleased to have access to the sort of information that isn’t part of the normal mass media,” he said.
“So in that sense, people are very thankful, but they are not always happy with what they discover.”
The next free film screening – Who Killed The Electric Car? – is at 7.30pm on Wednesday, 18 April, at the Water Discovery Centre, Newfarm Rd, Werribee. For details see www.envirowest.org.au
