Tamworth council forced to double water use to flush out algae bloom

Last week, council ordered about 105 megalitres over two days, well above the 20 to 25 megalitres it typically orders to meet the city's daily demand.

TRC water director Bruce Logan said council had trouble treating water due to an algae outbreak in the weir behind the Calala water treatment plant.

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"So we ordered additional water from Chaffey to be released to do two things; firstly, to flush out the weir pool that we're pumping out of at the moment," Mr Logan said.

"More recently, we need more water to replenish the reservoir that had been depleted while we worked out how to treat the water."

Mr Logan said although "some algae occur in our raw water supply" due to the outbreak, council staff had come up with a solution to the issue.

"Whilst we had that problem there, we've worked out how we can treat the water, even if there is algae in the Peel River," he said.

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"We've rigged up temporary treatment arrangements to address that issue. We'll move now to put that in permanently."

Mr Logan said there was concern algae blooms would become more frequent as the dam level and water quality dropped, but was confident in the steps council had taken.

"I'm certainly not guaranteeing that will be the last time [we have to order extra water], but I'm certainly hoping that's the case," he said.

"These measures we've identified and will put in place at the treatment plant in the next little while, will allow us to treat water that might have algae in it in the future."

Mr Logan said despite the algae issue, the water still met all the standards in the Australian Drinking Water Guidelines.

"If it doesn't, we don't release the water in to reticulation," he said.

Tamworth is using about 18 megalitres a day. TRC generally orders 20 to 25 megalitres, with the difference due to the amount of water lost in transmission along the Peel.

Chaffey Dam is currently sitting at 21 per cent. Tamworth, Moonbi and Kootingal will go to level 5 water restrictions when it drops to 20 per cent.