CERES uses savewater! award® to educate community on water conservation

With three finalist nominations under their belt, it seemed that CERES Community Environment Park in Brunswick was always a bridesmaid in the savewater! awards® . But that all changed in 2004 when they achieved a well-deserved win in the ‘Community Groups’ category.

Today, CERES is using the success from its win to help obtain funding to further improve the park and to establish research partnerships with local organisations.

“Our win had to happen sometime and we were elated by the recognition of our achievements,” says CERES Sustainability Projects Team Leader, Eric Bottomley of that special moment in 2004. “It was a fitting category to eventually win because our modest success grows out of community enthusiasm and ownership of the park.

“The three finalist nominations were actually very helpful as they inspired us to assess our operations and patiently work for improvement. We knew we had a win coming but it was up to us to accumulate some convincing evidence of the changes resulting from our work.”

And there’s no doubting that the work undertaken at CERES is impressive.

CERES (the Centre for Education and Research in Environmental Strategies, and also the name of the Roman Goddess for agriculture) is a community environment project located beside Merri Creek in the Melbourne suburb of Brunswick.

CERES aims to foster awareness and action on environmental and social issues affecting urban areas. The site has displays and functional demonstrations on a range of environmental issues to show just what can be achieved at household, community and global levels.

It presents environmental ideas in a stimulating way – and within a real life context - to 200,000 visitors per year.

Of these, about 60,000 are students from pre-schoolers to postgraduates.

“To expand the work of our water demonstration centre, we need to apply for grants; being able to use the savewater! awards® winners logo for 12 months after the win, and being able to promote that we’ve won a savewater! award® and been a three-time finalist, helps to reinforce our credibility,” Eric says.

“We are currently trying to improve on last year’s achievements and will certainly enter the awards again.”

Inspired by their win, CERES is currently working with Yarra Valley Water on new off-sewer toilets for the site. Dependent on their success with a grant, they will also be developing stormwater treatments for reuse on their organic farm.

With the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT), they will be testing different car park surfaces to help reduce peak flows and increase stormwater quality for reuse.

“Just the process of entering the savewater! awards® is useful to us as it forces us to reflect and critically examine our performance,” Eric says. “We also have to ensure we have proper data gathering systems in place so we have evidence of the success of our work.”

For Eric and the team at CERES, the savewater! awards® means an annual analysis of their site and sustainability practices so they can identify opportunities for improvement – winning their award was a bonus.