Thursday, 17th May 2012
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| Water storage may mean rise in Ashburton River levels |
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By Linda Clarke February 25, 2012
The Ashburton River has suffered low flows and poor water quality for years, and is acknowledged by experts as seriously over-allocated for irrigation. Federated Farmers supports TrustPower's application to vary the Rakaia's water conservation order to allow Lake Coleridge to store water on behalf of irrigators with existing abstraction rights. But the national farmer group has concerns about how the electricity generator and retailer will manage the store and release of water without privatising the water resourse. If a panel of three commissioners agree to the variation, TrustPower will create a register of existing water permit-holders and store water for them when the river is high; the water can then be released in times of low flow. But it is a service for which irrigators will pay. TrustPower said the register would not be compulsory, and life would be no different for existing irrigators who did not want to join. Those who did sign up would be able to take stored water when those outside the scheme were on restrictions. Federated Farmers national water spokesperson Ian Mackenzie, a Mid Canterbury arable and stock farmer, said the group's fears about privatisation would be allayed if En- vironment Canterbury was monitoring and policing the water arrangements. "That allays our fears in terms of the control of water being outside the people of New Zealand." The Ashburton District Council and neighbor Selwyn District Council also support the variation but don't want TrustPower in total control of the stored water. Should TrustPower's plan progress to implementing its Lake Coleridge Project, the councils want a stake-holder group to monitor changes in the river. "We don't believe existing users will be adversely affected," said Ashburton District Council operations manager Rob Rouse. 'But no-one will know until it is in place." Both councils and Federated Farmers also want TrustPower to pay more due to the Canterbury Water Management Strategy, a unique document adopted by territorial authorities to protect the region's water resources. The strategy covers environmental, cultural and recreational uses, as well as water efficiency and increasing irrigated land area. Storage in Lake Coleridge could double the irrigated land area in Canterbury to 1,000,000ha. Mr Hume said without the development of significant water storage, irrigation development would fall well short of the potential irrigated area. He said as well as encouraging farmers to produce more through intensive farming practices, storage would increase the region's resilience to climate change, which predicted less rain in the east and more in the west. The hearing resumes next week, with the commissioners scheduled to visit the Rakaia River mouth and Lake Coleridge.
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