From Blue Community Ambassador Erin O’Donnell:
In Victoria, Australia, the rise of data centres and their growing appetite for water is driving increased conversations about recycled water and how this can be used to support new industries. Victoria is also home to Australia’s first (and so far only) river to be recognised in settler law as a living entity. Birrarung (Yarra River) is also the source of up to 70% of Melbourne’s water, and the health and well-being of the river will be affected (positively and negatively) under future recycled water policies. We need to centre Birrarung’s well-being in all future discussions of recycled water. Chris Chesterfield and I have written a short book chapter (for publication in 2027) about how Birrarung’s status as a living entity needs to change the way we make policy about recycled water in Melbourne.
As this policy space heats up, we want policy makers to keep Birrarung at the forefront of their minds. The living river should be a collaborator and a co-designer in water policy that affects her, and we all have a responsibility to engage with Birrarung to make that happen.
This preprint chapter will be published in O’Donnell & Holley (2027) ‘Rivers have rights. What happens next? Implementing water governance and nature rights’. Download PDF
See also the upcoming visit of Blue Ambassador Erin O’Donnell to Switzerland and Germany
