Regional drought update 27 August 2019 waternsw.com.au Key customer messages • The BOM’s August to October climate outlook indicates a drier and warmer than average three months is likely for much of Australia, particularly along the NSW ranges. The Indian Ocean Dipole remains positive, typically associated with below average rainfall in southern Australia in winter-spring. The positive dipole is not likely to change until the monsoon season commences in the north in summer. • Drought conditions are deeply impacting town water supplies including major centres like Tamworth and Dubbo, but also many smaller centres are impacted; • The Southern valleys have improved with recent rainfall, improving catchment wetness, but rainfall for the year is still well below long term average and allocations and storage levels are low for this time of year. • Murrumbidgee has seen some improvement over the last month with general security irrigators receiving a 3% allocation in August. • Significant rainfall is required to break the drought in northern NSW and initial losses of 100- 150mm can be expected before significant runoff will occur in most catchments. Large shortfalls in reserves in all northern systems need to be captured in storage for high security deliverability before general security can receive any allocations. The BoM’s outlook indicates for August to October remains drier than average. • Water allocations in 2019/20 have been reduced for some high security, carryover water and conveyance licence holders due to reduced supplies and delivery constraints, while most inland systems have zero general security allocations on 1 July 2019. (see summary on back page) • A previously gazetted temporary pumping restriction remains in place in the Barwon Darling. The order limits extraction of the river flows to stock and domestic use, the environment and critical supplies including town water. The restriction will remain in place until 30 August 2019. Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 2 Weather Last week’s weather: During the past week, the southern parts of the state received negligible rainfall, apart from the Snowy Mountains region which received up to 50mm. The rest of the state remained dry. This week’s forecast: Daytime temperatures will be above average for the coming week, ranging from -3° in the south to 27° in the north. For the first part of the week, the coastal regions of the state should receive 1 to 10mm of rainfall. The rest of the state is forecast to remain dry. As the week progresses, the rainfall in the coastal regions is forecast to intensify, bringing rainfall across the central to eastern parts of the state of up to 100lmm. The western regions again are forecast to remain dry. Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 3 Longer-term outlook: The BoM’s three-month outlook indicates that • A drier than average spring is likely for most of NSW. The likelihood of drier conditions is stronger in October compared with September across the state. • Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 4 Water Quality Red algal alerts are currently in place at two WaterNSW regional monitoring sites within the state. These alerts are being seen at: • Burrendong Dam Station 1 • Lake Lyell Please visit https://maps.waternsw.com.au/AlgalAlerts/?mobileBreakPoint=300/index.html for more detailed information. Incident Response Guide Criticality Level Please visit https://www.industry.nsw.gov.au/water/allocations-availability/allocations/summary for more detailed information. Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 5 Drought heat map Please visit https://edis.dpi.nsw.gov.au for more information Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 6 Rural Dam Levels: 23 August 2019 Cap- River Valley Current Status Comments Allocations for 2019/20 acity Likeli- Weekly Est hood Carr % of change y- active Active of fill High Gen. Storage Dam, Nearest Town (GL) (GL) Supply Issues over cap- (GL) and spill Security Security @ acity 1/7/ 19 Border Rivers Glenlyon Dam, C’over restricted to 50% <1 254 8% 21 -0 <20% 100% 0% Stanthorpe (Qld) Deliverability restricted % C’over restricted to 50% Pindari Dam, Inverell 312 5% 15 -0 <20% 100% 0% <1 Deliverability restricted % Gwydir Valley Copeton Dam, Inverell 1346 9% 119 -0 Deliverability restricted <5% 100% 0% 3% Namoi Valley Keepit Dam, 419 1% 4 -0 C’over restricted to 0% <20% 75% 0% 5% Split Rock Dam, Manilla 394 2% 8 -0 C’over restricted to 75% <5% 75% 0% 22 Chaffey Dam, 98 22% 22 -0 Deliverability restricted <50% 50% 0% N/ Macquarie Valley C’over restricted to 0% Burrendong Dam, 1154 <20% 70% 0% 0% Wellington 5% 55 -1 Deliverability restricted Windamere Dam, 367 32% 117 -0 Regulated releases. <5% 70% 0% 54 Lachlan Valley Wyangala Dam, 1216 25% 301 -4 C’over restricted to 57% <20% 87% 0% 15 Carcoar Dam, Carcoar 36 20% 7 0 Deliverability restricted 10% 100% 0% 38 Murrumbidgee Valley Burrinjuck Dam, Yass 1025 32% 329 3 Min Planned eWater 40% 95% 3% 8% Blowering Dam, Tumut 1604 49% 793 -2 Min Planned eWater <10% 95% 3% 8% Murray Dartmouth, Mitta Mitta 3837 59% 2235 -40 Transfers to Hume N/A N/A N/A N/ Hume Dam, Albury 2982 42% 1238 83 Env orders and L Vic <25% 97% 0% 18 Lower Darling Menindee Lakes, 1633 1% 14 -1 Restrictions in place N/A 30% 0% 19 B k Hill % Hunter Valley Glenbawn Dam, Scone 750 50% 373 -2 Regulated releases 20% 100% 95% 23 Glennies Ck Dam, 282 50% 142 -1 Regulated releases 20% 100% 95% 23 Lostock Dam, Gresford 20 76% 15 -0 Regulated releases 100% 100% 100% N/ Coastal Area Toonumbar Dam, 11 60% 7 -0 Regulated releases 100% 100% 100% N/ Brogo Dam, Bega 9 87% 8 -0 Regulated releases 100% 100% 40% N/ Total 17748 32.8% 5823 31 WaterNSW has water resources in Dartmouth, Hume and Glenlyon Dams. TWS = Town Water Supplies . 1 Gigalitre (GL) = 1,000 Megalitres (ML) 1 ML = 1,000,000 litre Regional Weekly Drought Response Water Report 7 Details – Valley Overview AWD Storage Weekly GS 26 August 2019 Releases Inflows Volume inflows Comment % ML/d Required (GL) (GL) AWD Valley Dams (GL) Pindari 15.3 0 13 Border Minimum releases from Pindari. 0 31 Glenlyon 21.1 0 0 Gwydir Copeton 119 0 25 Minimum releases from Copeton. 0 41 Current releases are for Upper Split Rock 8.1 0 34 Namoi needs. No further releases Namoi 0 95 Keepit 4.2 0 0 from Keepit into the Lower Namoi until inflows occur. Chaffey Dam releases for Peel Chaffey 22 0 30 Tamworth. Level 4 water restriction 0 N/A*** for Tamworth. Current releases from Burrendong Dam are for town and D&S demand. Burrendong 55 0 105 Macquarie 0 346 Windamere 118 0 36 Current release from Windamere Dam are for Cudgegong demand as the bulk water transfer has been deferred. Regional customer drought update 8 AWD Storage Weekly GS 26 August 2019 Releases Inflows Volume inflows Comment % ML/d Required (GL) (GL) AWD Valley Dams (GL) Current releases from Wyangala Dam are mainly for TWS and S&D replenishment. Wyangala 303 2.6 708 Current releases from Carcoar Lachlan 0 280 Carcoar 8 0 2 Dam are low. Due to drought conditions, the end of system daily environmental flow requirement have been temporarily suspended. Minimum releases meeting 6.7 demand for: irrigation, planned Burrinjuck 329 470 environmental water (1,087ML/d Murrumbidgee 3 Blowering 793 1.8* 575 at Balranald and 50ML/day at Darlot) and held environmental water to Lowbidgee. Transfers from Hume for eWater and S.A. at higher rates as flows Murray Hume 1238 83** 4115 0 130 from Kiewa and Ovens Rivers reducing. Cease to flow - Bourke – no flow since 27 August 2018; CEWO water releases from Barwon-Darling N/A N/A Glenlyon reached Mogil Mogil N/A N/A and Copeton releases reached Warraweena. Warrego flow reached Wilcannia. Regional customer drought update 9 AWD Storage Weekly GS 26 August 2019 Releases Inflows Volume inflows Comment % ML/d Required (GL) (GL) AWD Valley Dams (GL) Four block banks have been constructed and filled, pipes closed. Lower-Darling Menindee 14.1 0 Negligible Releases from Lake Wetherell 0 N/A ceased on 12 Feb 2019. Supply to Broken Hill is being met from W2BH pipeline. * Includes inflows from Snowy Hydro, already budgeted. ** Includes inflows from Dartmouth and Snowy Hydro, already budgeted. *** The Department of Industry / Water monitors the resources regularly and the water allocation statement for the Peel regulated river is revised accordingly, depending on resource availability. More information Stay up-to-date with storage levels, system risks and climate conditions across NSW. You can also find valley-specific information about storage status, predicted release patterns and operating conditions. Subscribe to have the report emailed to you each week. Please visit our website at waternsw.com.au/subscribe for more information. For more information, visit our website at waternsw.com.au/drought or call us on 1300 662 077. Regional customer drought update 10 .