Melbourne Water

Last updated

Melbourne Water
Agency overview
Formed1992
Jurisdiction Government of Victoria
Headquarters Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Agency executives
  • Nerina Di Lorenzo, Managing Director
  • John Thwaites, Chairman of the Board
Website www.melbournewater.com.au

Melbourne Water is an Australian statutory authority owned by the Victorian State Government, which controls and manages much of the water bodies and supplies in metropolitan Melbourne, the capital of Victoria. Its jurisdiction includes all the reservoirs, lakes, wetlands, canals and urban creeks, and the sewerage and drainage systems that services the city.

Contents

Melbourne Water was formed by the merger of Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works and a number of smaller urban water authorities in 1992. Melbourne Water primarily operates under the Water Industry Act 1994 and the Water Act 1989. [1]

Overview

Melbourne Water is wholly owned by the Victorian State Government. It manages Melbourne's water supply catchments, sewage, rivers and major drainage systems throughout the Port Phillip and Westernport region. Governance of Melbourne Water is by an independent Board of Directors in conjunction with the Minister for Water.

Melbourne Water supplies water to the metropolitan retail water businesses (namely, Great Western Water, South East Water and Yarra Valley Water [2] ), other water authorities, local councils and the land development industry. [3] The Victorian Water Industry Association (VicWater) is the peak industry association for water companies in Victoria.

In 1994, Melbourne Parks and Waterways was separated from Melbourne Water, and became part of Parks Victoria in 1996.

Victorian Desalination Plant

The Victorian Desalination Plant is a A$3.1 billion desalination plant that was built in the Wonthaggi region of the Bass Coast. [4] The plant can provide an additional 150 gigalitres of water each year. [5] [6] The base fee payable to the owner of the plant, even if no water is ordered, is $608 million a year, [7] or $1.8 million per day, for 27 years. being between $18 and $19 billion in total. [8] On 1 April each year, the Minister for Water places an order for the following financial year, up to 150 gigalitres a year, at an additional cost to Melbourne Water and consumers. [8]

Northern Sewerage Project

Northern Sewerage Project is a major infrastructure project to increase the capacity of the sewerage system in Melbourne's growing northern suburbs. It will also help protect the Merri and Moonee Ponds Creeks by virtually eliminating sewage overflows that can occur after heavy rain.

Water restrictions

Melbourne Water has a system of restrictions to manage water supplies into the future. It reports on storage levels on Thursday each week [9] while an interactive graph compares actual use. Further reviews of restrictions were needed to counter an ongoing drought, poor rainfall, record low storage levels and rising water use compared with past years.

Infrastructure

The water supply system operated and managed by Melbourne Water comprises:

Water storages

Silvan Reservoir Silvan Reservoir.jpg
Silvan Reservoir

Melbourne Water manages the ten Melbourne reservoirs. The total storage capacity is 1,810,500 megalitres. [10]

Melbourne reservoirs
ReservoirCapacity (ML)Year completedLocation
Thomson 1,068,0001983 37°50′34″S146°23′56″E / 37.84278°S 146.39889°E / -37.84278; 146.39889 (Thomson Reservoir)
Sugarloaf 96,0001981 37°40′30″S145°18′18″E / 37.6749°S 145.3051°E / -37.6749; 145.3051 (Sugarloaf Reservoir)
Cardinia 287,0001973 37°57′49″S145°24′37″E / 37.9637°S 145.4102°E / -37.9637; 145.4102 (Cardinia Reservoir)
Greenvale 27,0001971 37°37′53″S144°54′17″E / 37.63139°S 144.90472°E / -37.63139; 144.90472 (Greenvale Reservoir)
Tarago 37,5001969 38°1′S145°56′E / 38.017°S 145.933°E / -38.017; 145.933 (Tarago Reservoir)
Upper Yarra 200,0001957 37°41′S145°55′E / 37.683°S 145.917°E / -37.683; 145.917 (Upper Yarra Reservoir)
Silvan 40,0001932 37°50′S145°25′E / 37.833°S 145.417°E / -37.833; 145.417 (Silvan Reservoir)
O'Shannassy 3,0001928 37°40′30″S145°48′20″E / 37.67500°S 145.80556°E / -37.67500; 145.80556 (O'Shannassy Reservoir)
Maroondah 22,0001927 37°38′05″S145°33′47″E / 37.63472°S 145.56306°E / -37.63472; 145.56306 (Maroondah Reservoir)
Yan Yean 30,0001857 37°33′S145°08′E / 37.550°S 145.133°E / -37.550; 145.133 (Yan Yean Reservoir)

Water supply catchments

Around 80% of Melbourne's water is sourced from uninhabited forests in the Yarra Ranges and Central Highlands. In excess of 1,570 square kilometres is reserved for water catchment. These forests primarily consist of Mountain Ash. Catchment areas have been closed to the public for over 100 years . [11] [12] [13]

Major catchments [13]
CatchmentArea (ha)Inflow (%)Comment
Thomson4870035.3mainly State Forest and a small section within Baw Baw National Park
Upper Yarra3367018.7within the Yarra Ranges National Park
O'Shannassy1187011.4within the Yarra Ranges National Park
Maroondah1654010.8within the Yarra Ranges National Park
Sugarloaf010.7water is pumped from the Yarra River and fully treated
Yarra Tributaries134803.8Armstrong, Cement, McMahons and Starvation Creeks (State Forest)
Wallaby91001.9within the Kinglake National Park
Total92.6

In addition to the reservoirs in the table above, water is harvested via a number of diversion weirs:

Point Coordinates
(links to map & photo sources)
Notes
Silver Creek Weir 37°21′22″S145°12′35″E / 37.356171°S 145.209854°E / -37.356171; 145.209854 (Silver Creek Weir) To Toorourrong Reservoir
Wallaby Creek Weir 37°24′16″S145°14′48″E / 37.404495°S 145.246650°E / -37.404495; 145.246650 (Wallaby Creek Weir) To Toorourrong Reservoir
Toorourrong Reservoir 37°28′32″S145°09′08″E / 37.475430°S 145.152296°E / -37.475430; 145.152296 (Toorourrong Reservoir)
Donnelly Weir 37°37′41″S145°32′10″E / 37.628°S 145.536°E / -37.628; 145.536 (Donnelly Weir) To Maroondah Aqueduct
Sawpit Creek Weir 37°38′02″S145°32′31″E / 37.634°S 145.542°E / -37.634; 145.542 (Sawpit Creek Weir) To Maroondah Aqueduct
Grace Burn Creek Weir 37°39′18″S145°34′26″E / 37.655°S 145.574°E / -37.655; 145.574 (Grace Burn Creek Weir) To Maroondah Reservoir
Badger Creek Weir 37°41′10″S145°34′55″E / 37.686°S 145.582°E / -37.686; 145.582 (Badger Creek Weir) To Silvan Reservoir
Armstrong Creek Weir 37°38′13″S145°51′36″E / 37.637°S 145.860°E / -37.637; 145.860 (Armstrong Creek Weir) To Silvan Reservoir [14]
Armstrong Creek East Branch Weir 37°38′17″S145°51′50″E / 37.638°S 145.864°E / -37.638; 145.864 (Armstrong Creek East Branch Weir) To Silvan Reservoir [14]
Cement Creek Weir 37°43′S145°45′E / 37.71°S 145.75°E / -37.71; 145.75 (Cement Creek Weir) To Silvan Reservoir [14]
McMahons Creek Weir 37°43′S145°53′E / 37.72°S 145.88°E / -37.72; 145.88 (McMahons Creek Weir) To Silvan Reservoir [14]
Starvation Creek Weir 37°46′S145°51′E / 37.76°S 145.85°E / -37.76; 145.85 (Starvation Creek Weir) To Silvan Reservoir [14]

Clearfell logging is permitted in the Yarra Tributaries and Thomson catchment areas. Some studies claims this reduces Melbourne's water supply arguing that young regrowth forest uses more water than existing forest [14] [15] [16] Some environmental groups claim that up to 30 thousand megalitres of water could be saved per annum by phasing out logging. This represents 6% of Melbourne's annual usage. [17]

See also

Related Research Articles

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References

  1. Melbourne Water : About Us : Who We Are : Who We Are
  2. Melbourne Water : About Us : Our Customers : Our Customers
  3. Melbourne Water about us
  4. Rood, David (4 February 2008). "In the eye of the storm". The Age. Melbourne.
  5. "Melbourne Water : Current Projects : Water Supply : Seawater Desalination Plant : Seawater Desalination Plant". Archived from the original on 20 July 2008. Retrieved 19 January 2008.
  6. "Microsoft Word - 132863.doc" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 9 April 2008. Retrieved 19 January 2008.
  7. "Subscribe to the Herald Sun". www.heraldsun.com.au. Retrieved 15 September 2016.
  8. 1 2 "Victorians pay dearly, but not a drop to drink". ABC News. 18 December 2012. Retrieved 2 January 2013.
  9. "Melbourne Water : Water : Weekly Water Update : Weekly Water Update". www.melbournewater.com.au. Archived from the original on 24 September 2005.
  10. Melbourne Water : Water : Water Storages : Water Storages
  11. "Water Catchments". Melbourne Water. Retrieved 22 November 2011.
  12. Department of Primary Industries. "Water Supply Catchment Protection". dpi.vic.gov.au. Retrieved 30 September 2011.
  13. 1 2 Dudley, Nigel; Stolton, Sue; Asante-Owusu, Rachel (2003), Running pure: the importance of forest protected areas to drinking water (PDF), World Bank/WWF Alliance for Forest Conservation and Sustainable Use, pp. 74–77, ISBN   978-2-88085-262-7 , retrieved 22 November 2011
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Feikema, Paul; Lane, Patrick; Peel, Murray; Sherwin, Chris; Freebairn, Andrew; Salkin, Owen (October 2006), Hydrological studies into the impact of timber harvesting on water yield in state forests supplying water to Melbourne – Part 1 of Hydrological studies, eWater Cooperative Research Centre Part 1a Archived 2011-03-27 at the Wayback Machine Part 1b Archived 2011-03-27 at the Wayback Machine
  15. Logging rainforest within the Melbourne's domestic water supply catchments, Victorian Rainforest Network
  16. National water week demonstrations expose logging in Melbourne's water supply, The Wilderness Society
  17. "Untitled Document". Archived from the original on 20 August 2006. Retrieved 5 January 2007.