Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award

Located in Chandler, East of Brisbane, Nursery Traders is a wholesale landscape supply company that brings together more than 200 quality selected wholesale growers and producers of horticultural products.

The company has implemented five major water harvesting and recycling projects with the aim of becoming completely water self-sufficient. Total on-site water storage capacity is now 698,000 litres, helping to reduce its reliance on potable water by 98.5% per hectare.

In February 2010, Nursery Traders completed its fifth waterrecycling project, installing a fully-integrated onsite weather station and a new sand filtration system. This latest project alone saw a saving of almost 83% or 4.279 megalitres in the year ended 30 June 2011.

In total, Nursery Traders saved over 59 megalitres of quality drinking water during the period 1 July 2010 to 30 June 2011. Nursery Traders has invested over $350,000 in sustainable water saving and recycling projects, appreciating support for two of its projects from Brisbane Water (now Seqwater) and the Queensland Water Recycling Strategy Community Demonstration Project.

Nursery Traders staff have been instrumental in promoting sustainable water practices throughout the business. Employees are trained in water recycling processes and participate in daily water checks. Nursery Traders also conducts customer information tours of its onsite water infrastructure to help promote the message of water sustainability in the community.

What’s more, the company has also fitted 228 solar photovoltaic panels to building roofs, generating more than 100,000 kilowatt-hours of green energy to date. In addition, new electronic reporting procedures save 32,605 sheets of paper per year, equating to 10,868 litres of water or 352 kilograms of carbon.

Tim Bunker, Managing Director of Nursery Traders Pty Ltd, is a proud winner of the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award.

“Being selected as a Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award winner is not only invaluable recognition of our team’s longterm enthusiasm, it helps us show industry that it is possible to profit sustainably,” says Mr Bunker.

Encore Tissue is a Melbourne-based manufacturer and supplier of toilet tissue, paper towels and out-of-home products to major supermarket groups and specialty retailers.

The tissue papermaking process requires large quantities of water to produce an evenly formed sheet of paper.

Although wastewater from this process is of a relatively good quality, it still contains small quantities of solids and fibre. Water used on the tissue machine must be free of solids to ensure that fine cleaning sprays do not become blocked.

Encore Tissue developed a solution to this problem in the form of the Kadant Petax Fine Filtration System, which provides economical, single-stage mechanical filtration of the wastewater. Filtrate then passes through the disk filter media and is directed into a collection tank for re-use.

Solids are collected on the outside of the filter and removed using a 3-stage cleaning process, with some solids able to be re-used (e.g. paper fibres).

With such large volumes of water being recycled, the reclaimed water was systematically reintroduced into the manufacturing process. Most functions of the process that previously used potable water now use recycled water.

Thanks to this advanced filtration system, Encore Tissue’s water consumption has been reduced by approximately 50%, with savings in the vicinity of 166 megalitres per year.

Encore Tissue employees play an active role in the company’s water saving and environmental initiatives, particularly those in the Engineering and Operation Management Departments who have been instrumental in the design, project management, commissioning and operation of the system.

Mark Holckner, Director of Encore Tissue (Aust) Pty Ltd, is delighted to see the company short-listed for the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award.

“Each and every one of the project stakeholders has a reason to be proud of the results which ultimately benefit the entire community and allows the resources we all share to be available for the longer term,” says Mr Holckner.

Geelong Racing Club (GRC) operates one of Victoria’s busiest racecourses, hosting 52 race meetings in 2010-11.

In recent years, GRC has invested heavily in water saving infrastructure around the facility. It replaced one of its grass race tracks entirely with a synthetic track, implemented a state-of-the-art stormwater harvesting system, and installed a 5000 litre rainwater tank for the horse stalls and a groundwater bore for the sand track.

The synthetic race track was constructed in 2007-08 to eliminate the need for any type of watering – an immediate saving of up to 40,000 litres of potable water per annum.

GRC’s stormwater harvesting system was constructed in 2009-10, meaning that all irrigation water for the racecourse is now sourced from onsite stormwater holding dams, with a combined capacity of 60,000 litres.

For the period 1 July 2010 to 30 June 2011, no potable water was used for racetrack irrigation (previously two grass tracks could use between 70-80 megalitres of water per annum). Irrigation now occurs with water from the stormwater holding dams being pumped directly to water efficient spray heads permanently fixed around the track.

The results have been impressive. GRC’s potable water consumption in 2005-06 was more than 49 megalitres. In 2010-11 it was just 2.668 megalitres. GRC’s initiatives have reduced its reliance on potable water by 90% in just 5 years.

Club members and the public are informed of ongoing water saving initiatives via regular newsletters, press releases and the website, as well as local radio stations and newspapers.

Geelong Racing Club Chief Executive, Paul Carroll, believes that drought-proofing the racecourse reserve is a true achievement.

“The Club is extremely proud of its water saving projects and it is an honour to be nominated as a finalist for the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award,” says Mr Carroll.

Plant Growers Australia (PGA) is a Melbourne-based wholesale nursery that produces and supplies over 1 million plants to the Australian garden and landscape industry annually.

The nursery is renowned for its cultivation of new and unique varieties, some of which are exported and grown around the world. What’s more, over 95% of PGA’s plants are propagated onsite, thanks to the construction of a state-of-the-art propagation facility in 2004.

Recognising the need to improve the nursery’s water usage practices, PGA embarked on a comprehensive irrigation project in 2007. The aim of the project was to develop a total irrigation system that delivered efficient water application to plants, improved collection and storage capabilities, and the use of recycled water for most irrigation purposes.

At a cost of $346,000, the nursery has significantly increased the capacity of the reticulation pond, installed additional water storage tanks and a chlorine dioxide unit for water treatment, and implemented high efficiency sprinklers and an irrigation pipe network throughout the property.

The new 500,000 litre storage tanks has also given PGA the ability to hold large amounts of recycled water ready for irrigation.

As a result of these measures, PGA has reduced their mains water consumption by 66% or 789,000 litres for the period 2010-11, after a 91% reduction during the previous 12 months.

Steve Eggleton, General Manager of Plant Growers Australia Pty Ltd, is thrilled to be a finalist in the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award.

“It is fantastic for the company and all the staff involved in the project to not only be seeing the benefits of water conservation ourselves, but to be recognised in these prestigious awards,” says Mr Eggleton.

The Village Centre is the largest retail shopping centre in Batemans Bay on the NSW South Coast.

Over the past few years, the Centre has played a leading role in the community as well as partnering with the local council in promoting sustainability awareness. The Centre has implemented a number of water efficiency projects, including the installation of waterless urinals, tap flow restrictors, dual flush toilets, and in Asian food outlets the replacement of water-cooled woks with air-cooled woks.

Water efficient and environmentally friendly cleaning and maintenance practices have been adopted. The gardens have been re-planted with water wise plants and six water sub-meters have been installed in retail outlets and toilets to monitor water usage throughout the Centre.

The Village Centre’s baseline water usage prior to undertaking these water saving initiatives was 25.74 megalitres per year. The total water used in the Centre during the period 1 July 2010 to 30 June 2011 was 13.93 megalitres – a 46% reduction in water use.

The Centre actively seeks to raise community awareness of its water reduction initiatives through a number of events and programs, such as the annual ‘’Green It We Mean It’’ Environmental Expo. Energy and water saving awareness nights for retailers and the introductions to recycling programs are also held throughout the year.

Schools in the area are also encouraged to participate in garden planting projects at the Centre, which educate local children on the benefits of adopting water efficient practices.

Brian Churchill, Property Portfolio Manager at Local Government Super (the owners of Village Centre), is excited to see the Centre recognised for its sustainability efforts.

“We recognise that water is a very valuable resource and that’s why reducing our water use in all the buildings we own is one of our top priorities,” says Mr Churchill.

Located in Launceston, Tasmania, Daisy Fresh Professional Dry Cleaners provide a complete retail and hotel valet service to 15 hotels and 13 agencies around Northern Tasmania.

The most common way of cooling dry cleaning machines is to connect them to the mains supply and run water through the system – an extremely inefficient use of potable water.

Daisy Fresh set out to eliminate this unnecessary wastage by designing and installing an innovative water tank collection system that recycled 100% of the water that passed through the machines.

The system diverts used water to the tank, after which it’s used for the wet laundry area and to flush toilets. The system also diverts the heated water from the machines to a header tank, where it is used to pre-heat the water for the gas hot water service. This greatly reduces the energy required for hot water heating.

In March 2010, Daisy Fresh installed two new dry cleaning machines, which are significantly more water efficient than the previous models. These machines also use an environmentally friendly solvent called D60 Hydrocarbon; any waste filter powder from this solvent is completely biodegradable.

Thanks to the above initiatives, Daisy Fresh saved 3.665 megalitres of water for the period 1 July 2010 to 30 June 2011, representing a 73.8% reduction in annual potable water usage. Daisy Fresh won the EcoSmartBiz Program Award at the 2008 Launceston Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards in recognition of these initiatives.

Mathew Bowen, owner of Daisy Fresh Professional Dry Cleaners, is pleased to see his organisation specifically applauded through the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award.

“It means a great deal to Daisy Fresh Professional Dry Cleaners to receive a Highly Commended in the Prime Minister’s Water Wise Award for the results we have achieved with water conservation,” says Mr Bowen.