TAMWORTH Regional Council will fight for a bigger share of water from Chaffey Dam.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The state-owned dam near Nundle is slowly approaching 20 per cent capacity as temperatures begin to climb.
The remaining water is entirely for Tamworth's town water supply and a new pipeline to be in place before the end of summer will hopefully stretch the supply twice as far.
READ MORE:
But the council's water director, Bruce Logan, said this drought was the "worst on record" and the whole system needs to be reassesed.
Mr Logan harboured concerns the water saved from the new pipeline would essentially be divvied up to Chaffey users other than council.
He wanted the water to be quarantined and guaranteed for the town supply.
"At the moment, the water that is in dam is all for Tamworth's use," Mr Logan said.
"It is not an issue in the short term, but it is something I would like to see discussed and there will have to be a decision made moving forward."
This issue will be addressed in council's submission to the Natural Resources Commission's review of the Peel water sharing plan.
The draft submission labelled the plan as flawed and said it left the city with inadequate water security.
Glenn Inglis claimed more than 500 days worth of water had been lost from Chaffey as a result of environmental and other releases.
Mr Logan verified the claim but said the council wasn't going to mention it in the water sharing plan submission.
"His calculations about how much water that was released into the system and how long that would have sustained Tamworth at 15 megalitres a day of use, they were right," Mr Logan said.