Strategy & business development: green innovation
The Green Living Centre was established in 2002 as ‘The Watershed’ and funded through the NSW Government’s Stormwater Trust Program. Its initial focus was on stormwater and local business environmental issues. Over the years this focus broadened to becoming a sustainability 'hub'.
Turning mill effluent into farm profit
An industrial paper mill near Albury needed a lessee for its Maryvale and Rosevale farms who could safely and productively use treated wastewater for irrigation. After treatment, this wastewater is high in nitrogen and phosphorous. It cannot be disposed in the Murray River because it accelerates algal growth, leading to oxygen crashes and fish kills. Irrigation use with a strict and supervised program of growth and crash feeding is very successful in the right hands.
Read the case study — Productive Use of Industrial Wastewater →
From Waste to Resource: Environmental Benefits
Downstream of Albury, Wonga Wetlands were developed to receive treated effluent from the city’s wastewater treatment plant, polishing the water and providing habitat, education and recreation opportunities. The challenge was to manage this system so that wastewater reuse, agricultural production and wetland values all reinforced rather than undermined each other, and to demonstrate that a working agricultural landscape could sit comfortably beside a high‑value wetland complex.
