An update on the extension of Port Macquarie’s reclaimed water network was presented to Federal Government representatives last week as a part of Council’s funding deal with Department of Sustainabililty, Environment, Water, Population and Communities.
Director of Cities and Towns Urban Water Security Craig Bradley and Assistant Director Tim McNaught inspected work on the 4.75km reclaimed water pipeline extension along the Oxley Highway, made possible with a $350,000 grant from the Australian Government’s National Water Security Plan for Cities and Towns Program.
Council matched the funding and expects to complete the $700,000 project by June 2012.
Acting Water Supply Manager Murray Thompson said many existing large water users were eager to utilise reclaimed water in place of potable water.
Douglas Vale Vineyard has now come on board as a commercial user of the alternative water resource as a result of pipeline extension works.
The ‘purple pipe’ network, separate to the region’s drinking water, currently stretches for more than 13 kilometres along Hastings River Drive to Hibbard Drive, to Wayne Richards Park, east along Gordon Street to Town Beach and through the CBD to Port Macquarie’s Town Green.
The Hindman Street Reclaimed Water Treatment Plant has the initial capacity to produce up to one megalitre (one million litres) of water each day.
This means that up to one million litres of treated effluent, previously released from the Port Macquarie Sewerage Treatment Plant into Kooloonbung Creek each day, can be diverted to the reclaimed water treatment plant for advanced microfiltration, reverse osmosis, UV disinfection and chlorination before being stored in the Morton Street reservoir.
