These are the guidelines that determine if an EES should be done for the proposed desalination plant.

The Environment Effects Act 1978 provides for assessment of proposed projects (works) that are capable of having a significant effect on the environment.

“What is the ‘environment’?
It includes the physical, biological, heritage, cultural, social, health, safety and economic aspects of human surroundings, including the wider ecological and physical systems within which humans live.”

And this is the reason why we would like to have an EES as stated as being the general objectives of an EES. (But maybe they are the reasons why the State Government is so hesitant??):
“The general objective of the assessment process is:
To provide for the transparent, integrated and timely assessment of the environmental effects of projects capable of having a significant effect on the environment.”

Ministerial guidelines for assessment of environmental effects under the Environment Effects Act 1978

This is the beautiful unspoiled area where the Desalination plant is proposed to be!

This is the Feasibility Study’s Table of Content:
Melbourne Water Seawater Desalination Plant
Feasibility Study Table of Content

And this is the Feasibility Study’s Executive Summary:
Melbourne Water Seawater Desalination Plant
Feasibility Study Executive Summary

This is still one of the best published answers (to this not very well founded never mind funded project) :
The Age - Kenneth Davidson - Premiers need to stop tilting at windmills and back effective water plans

It all started on Tuesday the 19th of June …. nobody worth ringing seemed to have any information about this, not even the local Bass Coast Shire Council. The message they gave out was that they waited for 11 o’clock am for a press release by the Victorian Premier Minister.

The initial media release from the Premier of Victoria:

Please note this most outrageous comment that just shows the lack of understanding of the water situation in the first place:
” “The plan will secure water supplies for regional centres, farms, and stressed rivers, and means we can steadily move back to unrestricted water supplies in our cities and towns,” he said. ”
DESALINATION AND PIPELINES TO SECURE WATER SUPPLIES

This is how it all came out, a week earlier than planned by the State Government, still in the last week of parliament’s summer break, because of THE AUSTRALIAN’s article
Desal plant key to $5bn water scheme