Politics & Council
3 March, 2024
Equal and fair pressure: works in pipeline
COLIBAN Water plans to upgrade storage and treatment at its Inglewood and Bridgewater plants in the next two years. Chief officer assets and operations Danny McLean said the government-owned water business was aiming to deliver equal and fair...
COLIBAN Water plans to upgrade storage and treatment at its Inglewood and Bridgewater plants in the next two years.
Chief officer assets and operations Danny McLean said the government-owned water business was aiming to deliver equal and fair pressure to all towns in its service area.
“The works are already programmed,” Mr McLean said.
Customers in the towns have complained about poor pressure amid concerns for future growth capacity.
Coliban last month asked residents in the towns to limit water use that managing director Damian Wells says was to linked water quality after the summer storms and the statewide power blackout that hit every Coliban treatment plant.
“We were tested right across the region,” Mr Wells said.
Mr Wells said upgrades at Inglewood and Bridgewater were part of Coliban’s $435 million capital investment in its current five-year plan.
But he said future upgrades to service infrastructure would be driven by demand and customers.
Mr Wells said it was important for property developers to understand costs and the role Coliban played in planning processes.
“We respond to that planning process procedure ... it (infrastructure upgrades) is a cost for the developers. Existing customers should not be cross-subsidising developers,” he said.
Mr Wells said there was no reason there would not be residential growth in Inglewood and Bridgewater in the next couple of decades.
“It’s prudent for us to have that in mind with changes in settlement patterns across the region,” he said.
“(But) our role as a state-owned water utility is that we exist to serve customers. It is not for us to impose our views on the community.”