ABC Central West / By Hugh Hogan March 22nd, 2023

Excerpt:

With the state election this weekend, NSW Labor said it needed more details before it could commit to the project.

“We don’t know what it’s going to cost. We don’t know clearly what the benefits are. We don’t know what the environmental impacts are going to be,” Labor water spokesperson Rose Jackson said.

“What Labor is doing is being honest about the processes that we’re going to follow … we haven’t seen the documentation, we haven’t seen the business case so we’re unable to make commitments.”

Environmental concerns

Not everyone is in support of the project which could have a price tag north of $2 billion.

Bev Smiles from the Inland Rivers Network said the environmental cost, including reduced water for wetlands, was too high.

“It captures the really important floods for the wetlands in the Lachlan Valley that are listed on the national list of important wetlands,” she said.

Ms Smiles said a bigger dam would not have had any effect on last year’s floods as operators were currently required to store as much water as possible for downstream users.

“New South Wales really needs to look closely at its dam management policy both for critical human needs in extreme drought … and the way they currently manage dams to keep them full as much as possible,” she said.

Full story here

The NSW Coalition government and the local fibre growing industry groups are making a controversial claim – that there is too much water in the Commonwealth’s environmental water accounts in the Wambuul/Macquarie and Gwydir catchments.

So how can the claim be made that these rivers are ‘over-recovered’, when the internationally significant wetlands they contain are rapidly declining?

This is a tale of how the convoluted nature of water management, and the deceitful abuse mathematical formulas and data can score you a big payday, if you’re prepared to stoop that low.

If you think it’s ludicrous to suggest that rivers can be too recovered, then please, read on!

The proposed Dungowan Dam & Pipeline project is a National Party promise for the electorate of Tamworth. It is economically unviable and has been questioned by Infrastructure NSW and the Federal Productivity Commission.

The summary of the final business case passed by NSW Cabinet in March 2022 demonstrates bias and a lack of analysis of alternative options to secure Tamworth water supply under future climate change predictions.

Inland Rivers Network President Beverley Smiles talks to Patrick Bell on ABC New England Monday 28th February 2022.

Questions about the cost of Dungowan dam are being asked by the community – how much will the Dungowan dam cost? Estimates are that it could be as much as $1 billion. That’s very expensive water!

Dams cause a lot of damage to rivers – Inland Rivers Network believes there are a lot better options for supplying long term urban water security for inland cities and towns such as purified recycled water, storm water capture and rain water tanks on every building in town.

The community needs to know – what alternatives have been costed, what cost benefit analysis has been done and what will happen to the price of water for Tamworth residents?

If the Government has nothing to hide, they will release the business case.

Published in the Northern Daily Leader – Tamworth

1st January 2022

Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby Joyce, seems to be blaming bureaucrats in NSW for delaying the Dungowan Dam (NDL 19 December 2021). He maintains that politicians have said that Dungowan Dam is going to happen and that ‘government is run by the people represented by politicians.’

Has Mr Joyce forgotten that elected governments make laws and bureaucrats are paid to implement those laws?

Large impactful infrastructure, like dams on rivers, must be assessed under state and federal law. In NSW there is the Environment Planning and Assessment Act, Water Management Act, Fisheries Management Act, Biodiversity Conservation Act and at the Commonwealth level there is the Water Act, Murray-Darling Basin Plan, Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act – to name a few.

In early 2022, construction of the new pipeline between Dungowan village and Calala water treatment works will commence. This is the ‘shovels in the ground’ project that will help to save water and improve Tamworth water security. The process to assess a new dam on the already stressed Peel River must be conducted carefully and consider the many adverse impacts. Meanwhile, less expensive, more sustainable alternatives must be considered to give the best value for public investment.

It is time that the proposed Dungowan Dam stopped being used as a political football during a federal election campaign.

Inland Rivers Network president Bev Smiles

Bev Smiles

December 13 2021

A larger Wyangala Dam cannot solve all problems and will create many new ones.

Inland Rivers Network continues to question the rationale behind spending up to $2 billion dollars of public money on raising the Wyangala Dam Wall when the purpose of the proposal is unclear.

With the current floods in the Lachlan Valley there are conflicting calls for this proposal to provide both increased water security and improved flood mitigation.

These competing roles require different dam management and water sharing arrangements. Increased water security requires a full dam while improved flood mitigation requires lower levels.

The recent high rainfall events in the upper Lachlan catchment from August to November have demonstrated that the proposed larger dam would not have prevented the floods at Forbes.

Analysis of inflows to Wyangala Dam since it first filled in August, based on real time inflow reporting on the WaterNSW website, shows that the proposed larger Wyangala Dam would have filled and spilled in early October.

Also, analysis of inflows to the Lachlan River from tributaries below the dam showed that Wyangala Dam releases from a larger dam would still have occurred at the same time the increased tributary inflows from the Belubula River, Boorowa River and other swollen water sources below the dam entered the Lachlan River upstream of Forbes.

The proposed increased capture of 650 billion litres of water would not have solved impacts of flooding at Forbes and downstream during these highly unpredictable large rainfall events.

Inland Rivers Network looks forward to the release of the next stage of the draft Lachlan Regional Water Strategy that will consider the impact of climate change on the region and prioritise a range of water security options.

The NSW Government has announced that alternative water security options will be considered in the final business case for a larger Wyangala Dam.

This is a welcome step in the assessment process for this very large and impactful proposal.

While the recent floods have been disruptive and damaging to settlements and crops on the floodplain, the rainfall has been recuperative for the natural environmental following the recent intensive drought conditions.

Depleted soil profiles and groundwater sources have been replenished.

Native fish have good breeding conditions and the best waterbird breeding since 2016 is occurring in the Lachlan wetlands.

The Listening to the Lachlan Conference in Forbes in February will discuss many of these issues.

Inland Rivers Network president Bev Smiles

https://www.cowraguardian.com.au/story/7548227/earth-first-a-larger-dam-will-not-fix-all-problems-in-the-lachlan/

Four dam projects are speeding through the approvals process in Western NSW:

• Raising of Wyangala Dam Wall
• Mole River Dam
• Macquarie River re-regulating storage project at Gin Gin
• Dungowan Creek Dam.

Taxpayers of NSW need to know how public funds will be invested (or wasted)

Send a message to the Premier to release all dam business cases when finalised.

The Business Case for the Macquarie River project is done and should be released immediately. The Business Cases for the other proposals must be released as soon as they are finalised.

More information:

On the Lachlan River people want answers:

“This project is a captain’s pick. The dam proponents have greatly exaggerated the benefits and the costs have been grossly underestimated. There is no coherent cost-benefit analysis.” said the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists’ spokesman, Jamie Pittock, a professor in the Fenner School of Environment and Society at the Australian National University.

Costs estimates have soared – originally a $650 million cost, now estimates are as high as $2.1 billion dollars.

There are better options for reducing the demand for water in the Lachlan, like the upgrading of Jemalong Irrigation infrastructure. Will these options be considered in the business case?

We want to know, will the Government follow the recommendations of the Legislative Council report Part 1 “Rationale for, and impacts of, new dams and other water infrastructure in NSW”?

Send a tweet to the Premier – @GladysB – Will you release the Wyangala dam business case? #Wyangala

Image WaterNSW

On the Mole River residents are angry:

“People along the Mole and Dumaresq Rivers below the dam site have been increasingly frustrated by WaterNSW failure to meet with them, discuss options for water management or to provide useful answers to questions. By pressing ahead in this way with a business case for a dam recently considered uneconomic, when these affected people are still in drought and struggling to recover from extreme fires, the government shows a lack of empathy.” Says local Mr Bruce Norris.

Environmental impacts within the dam footprint are being assessed… But are impacts downstream being assessed – on ground water intake? Aquatic ecosystems? Wetland such as Boobera Lagoon? Or on people along the Barwon Darling?

Email the Premier and ask – Will you release the business case for the Mole River Dam? What is your Government trying to hide? #MoleRiverProtectionAlliance

On the Wambuul-Macquarie River trust in NSW’s water management doesn’t exist:

The community have not forgotten how close we came to losing the river in the recent drought as a direct consequence of NSW mismanagement of water.

The proposed Gin Gin dam would give water agencies even more control over the river, and the means to sell even more water for extraction.

“We need to know what is in the business case. How much would this dam cost? Why are the public expected to foot the bill for a dam that will only benefit a few corporate and private interests?” says Mel Gray, convenor of Healthy Rivers Dubbo.

Less water in the river and a loss of habitat will hit struggling native fish populations hard. Will the financial impact of fewer fishers in the valley, and less water for downstream irrigators be assessed?

Tweet Dubbo’s local member @DugaldSaunders and ask – What is in the Macquarie River re-regulating storage business case? Show us the detail. #NoGinGinDam

In Tamworth residents want real water security:

Recently the Productivity Commission’s draft report on National Water Reform used the Dungown dam proposal as a case study for flawed decision making.

The dam is estimated to provide on average 6,000 megalitres of water a year, at a cost of more than $60,000 per megalitre. By comparison, the current market price of one megalitres is $1,341.

The report also pointed out the inescapable truth – that the water system is fully allocated, and any promise of ‘new water’ from this dam is an illusion.

Rather than spend $484 million on a dam, the same volume of water could be bought from entitlement owners for just $10 million dollars a year.

How can the business case for a dam proposal that the Productivity Commission chose to use as a case study for flawed decision making stand up to public scrutiny?

Email the Premier and ask – Does the business case for the Dungown dam proposal include options like using purified water in communities? Please release the business case!  #NoDungowanDam

Image: Namoi Valley Independent

Everybody wants to see the business cases!

When the major rivers of the Northern Murray-Darling Basin flow onto their lower floodplains they break up into thousands of smaller rivers, creeks, cowals, warrambools, flood runners and billabongs. One of these is the designated river. The floodplains of the Northern Basin make up a vast interconnected network of these streams. Floodplain water harvesting is the take of water from these floodplains.

Despite it being a large proportion of water taken for irrigation in the NSW part of the Northern Murray-Darling Basin it has never been regulated, measured or reported. The NSW government intends to license and regulate floodplain water harvesting by July 2021. Extraction will be accounted for under a water access licence, basic landholder right or licence exemption, ensuring that it is consistent with the Water Management Act 2000.

The amount of water taken by floodplain water harvesting will be measured and the volume distributed, after it is licensed. Owners of floodplain water harvesting licences will be able to be compensated for these new licences, should they be reduced in future.

Floodplain water harvesting has never been licensed, measured or monitored in NSW. On the 24th of March 2020, Helen Dalton, the NSW Member for Murray, asked Melinda Pavey, the Minister for Water, Property and Housing, in the NSW
Parliament:
What has been the volume of water extracted through floodplain harvesting in each financial year between 1993-94 and 2018-19?
The Minister replied:
“There is currently very limited data on the volume of water that has been extracted through floodplain harvesting in New South Wales because such volumes have not been required to be reported by landholders.”

At a public meeting in Dubbo on 16th March 2018 an officer of the NSW water department acknowledged that the volume of water taken by floodplain water harvesting had been:
“…grossly underestimated, …there is currently no monitoring of floodplain harvesting diversions.”

This report:

• Provides a background and summary of the NSW floodplain water harvesting policy and its implementation,

• Reviews research and reports related to floodplain water harvesting,

• Provides a map of on-farm storages on the floodplains of the NSW part of the Northern Murray-Darling Basin and the capacity of those storages.

Read the report here.21022 FPH Final Report