2009 AWA Award Recipients

David has been a member of AWA for over 20 years and his contribution to the Association is well known by many members in NSW.

Throughout his involvement, David has continued to be an outstanding advocate for AWA and the Water Industry.

For many years, David has served on the NSW Branch Committee, taking on several different roles including that of Branch Secretary and Branch President, and to this day he continues to put significant time and effort into his work on the Branch Committee.

David has also served for many years on the AWA's Board of Directors.

He has worked extensively over many years to assist in building the Association's profile and competence, both at a Branch and National level.

David has selflessly put in considerable time to assist in numerous areas of AWA's operations, freely giving advice, assistance and energy to many officers and other volunteers (including a number of Past National Presidents).

Kerry has been the Managing Director of Sydney Water since 2006. Before taking on this role, she also served as a non-executive Director of the Sydney Water Board from 1997-2001, and has led Sydney Water through a critical period where urban growth was competing with constrained water resources.

This role was followed by Chairmanship of the NSW Environment Protection Authority, when a new approach to environmental regulation and licencing were introduced, including whole-of-system environmental licences, and load-based licensing.

As Chairman of Australian Water Technologies in the late 90s, Kerry guided the organisation as one of the first utility-led companies to compete internationally throughout SE Asia and establish lasting linkages with major utility partners in the region.

Kerry has shown a strong commitment to education, leadership and public awareness through a variety of projects including the NSW Government’s Metropolitan Water Plan, and Sydney Water’s largest capital expenditure program in history - $5.6 billion over 5 years, mainly on recycling, desalination and asset growth and renewal.

Anne has been the Chief Executive of SA Water Corporation since 2001.

Under Anne’s leadership the Corporation undertook a huge transformation through the implementation of an effective performance management across SA Water which has enabled the organisation to exceed strategic goals aligned with the State Strategic Plan.

Anne has been passionate about progressing females in the industry through workplace policies that have embedded improved equity, diversity and gender programs and increased the number of women in leadership roles in SA Water.

Anne is also committed to promoting water careers and is a strong supporter and mentor for young professionals both within her organisation and in the industry.

In the context of the Australian water industry, Anne has made an outstanding contribution by giving her time and showing leadership on a variety of industry committees and Boards including WSAA Board (including 2 years as Chair), CRC for Water Quality and Treatment, Water Quality Research Australia (WQRA), South Australian Stormwater Management Authority, The Barton Group and the Water Industry Skills Taskforce.

The Gold Coast Waterfuture (GCWF) Strategy provides a blueprint for sustainably managing the city’s water supply over the next 50 years.

Adopted by Gold Coast City Council in December 2005, the strategy sets a new benchmark in innovative water planning.

The strategy is one of the first long-term water supply strategies to be developed in Australia, underpinned by diversity, adaptability and sustainability and embracing the goal of constant environmental improvement.

Three years on, the GCWF Strategy is achieving its aspirations and objectives.

The strategy’s implementation in the real and dynamic world has ensured that the aspirations become reality and that water resources are conserved.

Sarah commenced her career with SA Water, where she became familiar with water treatment and supply issues and emerging desalination technology.

Now, in the consulting field, she is developing new technical skills as a water engineer, and frequently experiences first-hand some of the political and environmental issues facing the Murray Darling Basin, through work on a wide range of design projects relating to wetlands and Lower Lakes management. Sarah has also recently commenced a PhD in Coastal Engineering, investigating improvements to the way in which the Murray Mouth is dredged to maintain tidal flows into the Coorong.

Sarah completed an honours research project in 2005, which investigated environmental, social and economic issues surrounding declining wetland health along the River Murray. For this project, Sarah and her fellow researchers were awarded the 2006 Undergraduate Water Prize.

Sarah continues to pursue her passions in the water industry through her ongoing involvement in AWA with her roles on the SA and National YWP committees as well as national Specialist Network Committees.

She is particularly passionate about knowledge-sharing, developing professional support and communication networks, and providing technical support to colleagues helping disadvantaged communities develop safe water and sanitation facilities.

Small dams in inland Australia are key farm infrastructure and are essential for the economic survival of rural business during sustained drought.  However, harsh arid climatic conditions result in annual evaporation losses greater than annual water usage. The purpose of Alexandra’s study was to investigate the feasibility of replacing small farm dams with groundwater dams, constructed by filling the farm dams with gravel or sand. 

Alexandra’s study concludes that the application of groundwater dams would be beneficial in arid areas of Australia for larger, deeper storages, however not much benefit is seen in their application in semi-arid regions.  Groundwater dams reduce evaporation losses and appear to be an effective storage solution but more detailed simulations over longer climatic periods as well as field trials should be undertaken before they are implemented in Australia.

The planet is facing many major environmental problems, of which three were targeted for investigation. Firstly, freshwater is becoming an exceptionally scarce resource. Secondly, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 are rising steadily, and thirdly, fossil fuel supplies are running out.

One global response to the problem of diminishing fossil fuel levels has been a huge increase in cultivation of land crops, like corn, to produce plant biomass for biodiesel. However, these crops are irrigated with fresh water and are using land space that is in high demand for food production. Some algal species have been found to be very suitable for the production of bio-fuels because of their highly unsaturated fatty acid contents, but my research reading so far shows that freshwater algae are predominantly used.

This research set out to investigate if plant biomass for biodiesel production could be produced in marine environments, thus eliminating the necessity to use fresh water. The potential of the system to sequester atmospheric and industrial CO2 was also investigated as an added environmental benefit.

The 2009 Michael Flynn Award sponsored by Ecowise Environmental for Best Platform Presentation during Ozwater’09 was awarded to Jim Morran for his presentation on "Factors Affecting NDMA Formation".