All posts by geoff

It’s Time

Steve on the Goulburn
Steve Posselt has paddled the length of the Darling Murray river system

We know that Climate Chaos will tear our civilisation apart but we allow our governments to protect a handful of investors while they risk the future.

It’s time to take the action into our own hands and show that we will not stand idly by and allow our future to be flushed down the toilet in the interest of short term profits.

It’s time to divest our savings from the fossil fuel sector

It’s time to vote out those politicians who claim science as a servant of the economy instead of a method for discovering the truth.

It’s time to embrace the revolution in every community, support local enterprise, reduce our ecological footprint and to build a stable future, not a future based on mythical infinite growth.

Steve Posselt has dragged his kayak upstream and overland down Australia’s largest river network and some of its most embattled rivers.

Many of Australia's Rivers are dry as a result of climate change
Many of Australia’s Rivers are dry as a result of climate change

He has backed a successful plan to stop the damming of the Mary River.

He has argued the toss with Mayors of capital cities and country towns about climate chaos and the impact on their communities.

He has decided that It’s Time to take his mission all the way to the top, starting at the northern edge of the North American continent and heading all the way down to New Orleans.

He will visit many of the scenes of drastic weather conditions where people have experienced first hand the climate chaos caused by the incredible amounts of carbon dioxide we have pumped into the air.

He will be calling on you, to support him and show your local, state and federal politicians that it is time they take this issue seriously or be left behind in the global movement that is going to take its money out of the system unless the system wakes up.

We will not allow our children and grandchildren to be cooked by the short sighted selfish investors backing the fossil fuel sector.

It’s time for a change.

Cry Me a River (the book)

Cry Me Book Cover

Cry Me A River is the account of one man’s journey to the heart of Australia’s water crisis. A lifetime engineer in the water industry and successful businessman, Steve Posselt put everything on the line to paddle or drag a kayak from Brisbane to Adelaide down the full length of the Darling and lower Murray so he could see, first hand, what is happening to Australia’s rivers.

Along the way he talked to school children, farmers and local councils about climate change, water management and sustainability, eliciting their visions for the future. He started out a water engineer with an open mind and some concerns. He ended up alarmed, ashamed and determined to change.

Cry Me Book CoverAccompany Steve every step of this 3,000 kilometre journey. Weigh up what he saw with what he was told. Experience the adventure with him; the highs, the lows and the occasional confusion. Enjoy the father and son relationship. Make up your own mind about the state of the rivers.

Steve Posselt calls himself a civil engineer who, he says, happens to be able to read the writing on the wall, telling us that our rivers are dying. And after his extraordinary journey paddling and walking thousands of kilometres along the Murray Darling river system which he so entertainingly chronicles here, he speaks with authority. While his journey is exhilarating as he sweeps us along in his personable style, the way he describes the beauty of our landscape and its devastation, becomes a wake up call to everyone in Australia.

We simply cannot continue as we have been – burning fossil fuels, putting in infrastructure to sell our resources to other countries, having questionable irrigation practices and simply taking and taking without heeding the laws of nature. Steve explains how wetlands serve a purpose, how our rivers are the arteries of our landscape and how we must share water wisely – with each other, the wildlife and the landscape and that long term management of the natural systems is a necessary condition of our survival.

Steve’s journey, his knowledge and experiences, are a beacon, a warning and, hopefully, the start of a solution. Join him on his travels through the pages of this book and learn, as I did, how close we are to midnight when our rivers will perish. Steve does not preach, but he is an acute and interesting observer who concludes. . .

“We all want build a way of life that benefits our children and our grandchildren. If what we build is not sustainable, then we have robbed them of their inheritance. From my observations that is exactly what we have done.
Our river systems are precious. If they die, we die. And they are dying.”


“Thank you, Steve – I hear you cry and I cry too”

Di Morrissey February 14 2009

“ This is a ‘must read’ for those interested in discovering how rivers really are the arteries of our country. Steve has chronicled his discovery of the current state of one of our greatest rivers and challenges us all to be a part of the remediation and protection of all rivers. It is a challenge that he has taken on with amazing courage.”
Mark PascoeCEO, International Water Centre

“One man’s amazing and selfless journey to highlight the plight of our major inlands river systems.
Queensland Canoeing wholly congratulates this effort to sustain the waterways for future users.
Mark PriestleyExecutive Officer, Queensland Canoeing Incorporated

“Steve Posselt is one of those amazing people that will risk all for an issue. He doesn’t just talk about the problems facing the planet, he goes and sells his business, gets out there amongst it, and draws attention to the crises that we face. In this easy to read camp fireside chat, Steve vividly highlights the dreadful damage that we have done to, and continue to inflict on our rivers. Highly recommended for anyone concerned about our environment.”
David A Hood, FIEAust CP Eng
Chairman of Australia’s College of Environmental Engineers
Chairman, Australian Green Infrastructure Council