Melbourne's Millennium Drought Strategies May Help a Dry California

The Millennium Drought in southeastern Australia may hold lessons for drought-stressed regions around the world. The city of Greater Melbourne has successfully implemented innovations that may tell other cities how to survive droughts.

"Documenting what happened in Melbourne during the Millennium Drought was a real eye-opener," said Stanley Grant, the senior author of the new study, in a news release. "It's like looking into what the future could be for California, if we got our act together."

By the time Australia's worst-ever recorded drought ended in 2010, one in three Melbourne households had a rainwater tank, similar to a rain barrel in the U.S. In addition, many had built retention ponds to contribute to the urban water supply, for which they still earn credits on their bills. Highly treated sewage water was used to irrigate farm fields, and infusions of drinking water into bone-dry streams to help wildlife were halted.

In fact, what truly helped Melbourne was integrated outreach by utilities and agencies. This led to a culture shift among ordinary water users.

In contrast, four years into the state drought in California, average residential water use in Los Angeles was twice as high as Melbourne's-83 gallons per day in January. The state average is 109 gallons. In addition, Palm Springs residents average a staggering 347 gallons per day.

The researchers found that the single most helpful factor in Melbourne was an integrated water management system. In sharp contrast to the highly decentralized water systems in California and elsewhere, federal programs provided funds to the state of Victoria, whose officials then aided Melbourne.

"You can't just come up with technical innovations and think that's going to do the trick," said David Feldman, one of the researchers. "You need education, you need public outreach, and you need all these people working on it. During the drought in Australia, if you watered your lawn, you heard about it from your neighbors."

The findings reveal what strategies work during severe droughts. This may be especially useful for regions like California that are currently experiencing drought.

The findings are published in the journal WIREs Water.

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