BASS MP Jordan Crugnale has gone all ‘old school’ in trying to get most of the available information out to Inverloch homeowners and residents about the town’s beach erosion crisis.

Over the Australia Day long weekend, Ms Crugnale had an “amazing crew” out letterboxing every home in the town with details about the situation, discussing the likely response and providing links and references for further reading.

She also highlighted a “really informative” Bass Coast Shire Council video which she said “speaks to what’s happening, engineering options explored, next steps including the large-scale dune restoration project scheduled for this spring".

“Have a read, check out the FAQs which speak to why groynes, rock walls, offshore breakers aren’t suitable for Inverloch’s complex coastal and estuarine environment”.

The frequently asked questions section (on DEECA’s “Marine and Coasts” website, search “Cape to Cape Resilience Project”) responds to queries about hard engineering options, claiming they are unsuitable in the Inverloch context while also putting “retreat” including “land buy backs/swaps/lease back arrangements” firmly on the agenda.

However, the letter doesn’t directly address what the government will do if the Inverloch Surf Lifesaving Club starts falling into the sea during the next episode of high tides and storm surges.

Ms Crugnale has been asked to comment.

The letter is reprinted below and attached HERE & HERE)

From the FAQ section

Here is an excerpt from ‘frequently asked questions’ section of DEECA’s Cape to Cape Resilience page (Click HERE to access all questions):

• Other coastal locations have engineered rock structures to protect the foreshore. Why hasn’t a rock wall been recommended for Inverloch Surf Beach
• In feedback received during the project’s many types of community consultation (various surveys, drop-in sessions, pop-ups, markets, and roundtables), the local community expressed strongly that the natural beach and coastal landscape of Inverloch is what they value the most about Inverloch’s coast. It is a significant recreational and tourism asset, and losing the beach would have wide ranging negative impacts on the town’s amenity, liveability and economy. A rock revetment, like the one at Cape Paterson-Inverloch Road, will cause erosion in front of it, lowering the beach level. It will not help sand to stay on the beach. This would mean that Inverloch Surf Beach is only useable at low tide. The ends of the wall would behave just like the sandbag seawall, eroding the dune either side during storm events. Extending the wall to make it longer would just move the problem further either side because there is no natural hard headland to tie it into.
• Why isn’t a long rock groyne at Point Norman suitable for Inverloch Surf Beach?
• A rock groyne at Point Norman would stop sand moving east into Anderson Inlet. It would not stop sand being eroded and shifting offshore from Inverloch Surf Beach during storm events. The modelling indicates that a rock groyne would need to be around 300 - 500m long to work properly with the length of the beach and help keep sand in front of the Inverloch Surf Life Saving Club. A deep channel would form on the inlet side of the groyne, causing increased currents and making it unsafe for many water activities. The deep channel would likely undercut the base of the groyne and destabilise it. It would cost around $45 million to build, and beach nourishment would also be required.
• Why aren’t offshore breakwaters suitable for Inverloch Surf Beach?
• Offshore breakwaters would need to be so large that they would always be visible above the water from the beach, even at high tide. They would block the view to the ocean from the beach, significantly impacting beach amenity. They would cost around $40 million to build and would also require beach nourishment. By design, they would change the local wave conditions, meaning they would also impact on the recreational amenity, and the ability to surf in these areas.
• What does land transition/retreat look like and who will pay?
• Transitioning the way land on the coast is zoned and used enables public land to be maintained for access for all Victorians. As sandy beaches and dunes erode due to coastal processes and hazards including sea level rise, what is presently public land will get narrower until in some locations, there is none. This will mean that there is less and less beach for the public to use, and the coastal dunes will no longer provide a natural protective buffer to public and private assets behind them. If we transition land use by relocating assets away from the hazard areas, we can maintain public coastal land into the future. This problem is affecting many sandy shorelines around the world where people have built assets close to the coast. There are many ideas for how land use transition (or retreat) can be done, and governments worldwide are tackling this in various ways. The Australian and Victorian governments don’t yet have a strategy on how to approach and implement retreat, but some options, like land buy backs/swaps/lease back arrangements, are outlined in the Victoria’s Resilient Coast: adapting to 2100+ Adaptation Actions Compendium and will be explored further during the policy development project. The Victorian Government has recently been awarded a Commonwealth grant to work with local coastal governments on developing retreat policies to improve climate change adaptation and resilience. So exactly how governments can do retreat on the coast is still be investigated. We can draw from experiences in other sectors - such bushfire hazard zones and critical infrastructure projects, in shaping a retreat approach for at-risk coastal areas.

Bass MP Jordan Crugnale’s letter

Dear Inverloch residents,

This spring will see the start of a massive dune reconstruction project to protect our beautiful beach. This is the first of a series of regular newsletters to update you on the project.

Background: We have all watched with alarm the changes to the Inverloch surf beach over the past 10 years. The problem of coastal erosion is not peculiar to Inverloch. All around the world, coastal communities are confronting the same challenges.

Inverloch is a particularly complex coastal environment. A dynamic estuary system, changed wave patterns in Bass Strait and climate change have combined to cause the most severe beach erosion in the state.

Inverloch is also the most studied part of the entire 2500km Victorian coastline, thanks to the Victorian Government's Cape to Cape Resilience Project involving multiple government agencies and the Bass Coast Shire Council.

In 2022, we secured $3.3 million from the Federal Government's Coastal and Erosion Mitigation Program to address coastal erosion.

Coastal erosion management is a growing discipline with thousands of case studies to draw on from around the world. Our researchers have looked at global best practice to determine the best solution for our beach.

While some communities have opted for hard engineering solutions such as rock walls and groynes to protect houses and infrastructure, the results are clear: if we put in a rock wall at Inverloch it will lower the sand level, and we will lose our beach. It will also create scouring at each end of the wall.

Dune reconstruction

The Inverloch community has stated overwhelmingly that the sandy beach and coastal landscape are what we value most. It's why most of us live here, it's why thousands of people visit Inverloch.

In Australia more and more councils and state governments are turning to dune reconstruction and vegetation as the best way to preserve beaches while protecting homes and other buildings. The advantage of sand is that it absorbs and dissipates the force of the sea rather than transferring it, and it restores the natural contours of the beach rather than destroying them.

Byron Bay was facing similar problems to Inverloch when they began their dune restoration project in 2022. Since then, erosion has been significantly reduced, beach amenity has been restored and environmental values continue to improve.

The South Australian Government has carried out a number of projects to

stabilise and replant dunes, including at West Beach near Adelaide.

Dune reconstruction is not a permanent solution to rising seas, however it is the first step in the adaptation plan recommendations that goes towards building back the beach, raising its level, protecting threatened assets like the Surf Club and the dune vegetation for potentially the next 10 years.

The Timing

Large-scale dune reconstruction of the Inverloch surf beach will begin in early spring, using a large barge to pump up to 200,000 tonnes of sand onto the beach to recreate the dune.

Make no mistake, this dune will be as highly engineered as any other coastal protection measure but designed to protect the beach using a local material that's cheap and plentiful.

The dune needs time to stabilise over the spring and summer before the south-westerly storm surges begin in autumn. Planting of the dunes with suitable species including coastal native grasses is a crucial part of the project and is best done in spring.

In the meantime, the Inverloch Interagency Working Group will continue to monitor the coastline to determine whether emergency sand renourishment works are needed to protect the existing dunes in response to the expected autumn and winter storms.

Timeline for 2025

• January: Dune draft designs due
• February: Community engagement
• March: Finalise designs
• April: Tender for construction
• Aug-Nov: Dune construction and planting

Some QR codes and links are attached to the letter.