Dam in view of supply red line

Council predicts rise in water restrictions if rains stay away from catchment

WATER restrictions could be enforced over the Christmas holidays unless a well-earned drenching hits the Copperlode Dam catchment.

The dam is currently sitting at 83 per cent capacity, slightly down compared to 87 per cent at the same time last year.

Cairns Regional Council’s water and waste portfolio chairman Cr Richie Bates said the situation was not dire but restrictions were on the horizon, also taking the opportunity to plug the council’s new water-saving app.

“It’s possible we could drop below the 80 per cent threshold for the next level of controls before Christmas,” he said.

“This is a timely reminder for people to be water wise and use council services such as the Thrive mobile app to determine how much water their garden needs.”

The council had been scheduled to rollout its new smart water meters in September after awarding a $15.9 million contract to Itron Australasia.

The water and waste committee this week heard the scheme was still under negotiations and expected to be signed off this month.

The committee resolved to write to Building Queensland to request for a long-overdue report into the region’s water security to be finally released.

It heard the author of the unfinished report had resigned from the statutory body.

“Maybe there’s some parallels where we are with this with energy generation,” Mayor Bob Manning said.

“We tend to wait until it’s pretty late and all of a sudden it starts to close in on us. We know there’s a red line … that’s coming closer all the time.”

Cr Manning urged residents to exercise restraint when watering their gardens.

“There’s a nice build-up of clouds and Copperlode does fill very quickly – it’s got a great little catchment,” he said.

“But we need to be mindful of the fact we don’t have a never-ending supply up there.

“It’s better to conserve now than to get into a position where if we don’t get rain, we’re in a real fix.”