Tamworth Regional Council is set to vote on Tuesday to purchase temporary water to replenish Scott Road Drift Wells' supplies.
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It's recommended council buy up to 240 megalitres of Peel Alluvium water on the temporary market to attach to the four Scott Road Drift Wells, allowing ongoing extraction this year.
Advice given to council says the cost is around $100-a-megalitre, meaning council would have to fork out roughly $24,000. With no money put aside for this purchase, it would come out of the water reserve fund.
Sweltering through a heatwave at the start of the month, Tamworth, Kootingal and Moonbi's water use peaked at 28.5 megalitres on December 2.
Groundwater was extracted from the wells to keep up supply and contingency water storage levels up in the storage dam at the Calala Water Treatment Plant.
Groundwater had to also be sourced while the Dungowan Pipeline was repaired.
On December 7, 36.5 megalitres was available - roughly six to seven days left drawing from Wells 3, 4, 5 and 6.
The water purchase would enable a further 40 days of extraction from the wells.
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"Since July 2020, council staff have been in discussions with the Department of Planning, Industry and Environments (DPIE), WaterNSW and the Natural Resource Access Regulator (NRAR) regarding the opportunity to source more groundwater from Wells 3, 4, 5 and 6," a report to council from water operation manager, Daniel Coe, said.
"The advice to date from these agencies is that council's existing groundwater access approval now has a discretionary condition which permits extraction from the wells of up to 350ML for the 2020/2021 year."
Council has already been ordered to pay fines in relation to their over-extraction of Scott Road Drift Wells.
