"We reckon desalination is a dud and there's plenty of evidence for that. Options such as industrial reuse of water, water recycling and stormwater management all offer better, cheaper options," Mr Barber said.

"The Liberals should check out the report by the Australian Conservation Foundation, showing even an expanded water tank program could beat desalination, without all the environmental negatives," Mr Barber said.

"Even a 125 megalitre per day desalination plant would produce up to a quarter of a million tonnes of CO2 equivalent each year and we don't need that when we are trying to get Victoria's greenhouse emissions going down rather than up," Mr Barber said.

" What we need in Melbourne is to set targets for water efficiency, break them down across the various sectors of the economy and get on with implementing them. Even better would be to end logging in the mountain forests which provide our water. Young regrowth trees from clearfelling suck up heaps of water, leaving less for our rivers and dams," Mr Barber said.

"The proposal for a desalination plant in Sydney was rejected by an upper house inquiry of that State's parliament. The NSW government-appointed group chaired by Clean Up Australia founder Ian Kiernan described desalination as the "least favored and least acceptable" option for securing Sydney's water supply," Mr Barber said.

Speaking in Parliament today, Mr Barber described a desalination plant as a quick fix, high cost, high tech, magic bullet solution, with a photo opportunity. By contrast, the Greens were calling for lower risk solutions that lead to better outcomes. He described the water savings from reduced consumption as “negaliltres” rather than “megalitres”.

For further comment: Greg Barber 0433 044 771