The Upper Murrumbidgee River has been ignored by policy and profits
How did this happen?
The Water Act 2007 (Cth) provides the legislative framework for ensuring that the Murray–Darling Basin – Australia’s largest water resource – is managed in the national interest. Currently, this Act explicitly excludes structures managed by the Snowy Hydro scheme, which means this organisation’s management of the headwaters of our major rivers - the Murray, Murrumbidgee and Snowy, sit outside the national framework we have in place to ensure critical drinking water and flows for the environment.
It is significant that the Water Act 2007 (Cth) defers water management for the Upper Murrumbidgee and other rivers operated by Snowy Hydro, to the Snowy Water License and the Snowy Water Inquiry Outcomes Implementation Deed (SWIOID). This document – agreed to in 2002 – is now vastly out of date with contemporary river management, and in its current form, will ensure the continued decline of the Upper Murrumbidgee River. While all other legislative instruments have scheduled review points, the SWIOID does not.
Now 20 years old, the current operational arrangements stipulated in the SWIOID are ensuring that the environmental, Cultural and social objectives set out in the NSW Water Sharing Plan for the Murrumbidgee Unregulated Water Sources cannot be met and there is no lever to improve these rules unless we have a formal review.
The time is well overdue for the SWIOID to be reviewed by NSW, Victorian and Commonwealth governments, to allow our headwater catchments including the Murrumbidgee to be brought into line with best practice river management. Outcomes from this process should be incorporated into the Water Act 2007 (Cth) which is scheduled to occur in 2024. This will ensure these rivers become part of a healthy, working Murray-Darling Basin.
Wait, did you say ‘Unregulated’?
The river is classified as ‘unregulated’ under NSW legislation - an astounding situation given that it is a river without over 90% of its flow - and therefore highly regulated. Because the river is classed as ‘unregulated’, it means flows can be extracted under the current Water Sharing Plan arrangements.
The Upper Murrumbidgee River is termed unregulated because the Tantangara Dam’s purpose is to contain water for Snowy Hydro operations. If the dam’s purpose was to manage downstream flows to meet the water “orders” of river pumpers who hold regulated water licences, it would be termed regulated. Licenses under the Unregulated Water Sharing Plan are allowed to extract water if there is sufficient flow in the river to pump.
As a result, Tantangara Dam captures more than 90% of the water at the headwaters of the Murrumbidgee, which flows into the storage as part of the Snowy Hydro Scheme, leaving a very small percent to flow beyond the Dam leading to dire long-term consequences. In this sense, the Upper Murrumbidgee River is one of the most regulated ‘unregulated’ rivers in Australia.
Image: Tantangara Dam and spillway across the Murrumbidgee River
We need to expect more from Snowy Hydro
Snowy Hydro is a Government Business Enterprise (GBE) – essentially a private company solely owned by the Government. In 2018 the Commonwealth took on sole ownership of Snowy Hydro (previously, it was jointly owned by NSW, Victoria and Commonwealth, with NSW as the majority shareholder) – see more information on this here.
There are two Commonwealth shareholders, the Minister for Finance, currently Senator The Honorable Katy Gallagher, and the Minister for Climate Change and Energy, currently the Honorable Chris Bowen MP.
In October 2021, the then Shareholders, the Honorable Simon Birmingham Minister for Finance and the Honorable Angus Taylor Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction issued a ‘Statement of Expectations’ to the Snowy Hydro Board. As Snowy Hydro is a company, the Board is obligated to manage Snowy Hydro in the interests of its shareholders, that is, to meet their expectations.
The October 2021 Statement of Expectations is entirely about Snowy 2.0 and Snowy Hydro’s operations in the electricity and gas markets. Environmental considerations are not mentioned, downstream water users are not mentioned, Cultural and social flows are not mentioned – in fact, there are no expectations relating to the $1.38 Billion Dollars equity provided by the Federal Government to proceed with Snowy 2.0, that relate to anything other than energy production and distribution.
Importantly, the Shareholders can update their Statement of Expectations at any time. The Honourable Katy Gallagher is our new Finance Minister so she is now one of the Snowy Hydro Shareholders, as well as being a Senator for the ACT. We want to work with The Honorable Katy Gallagher and The Honorable Chris Bowen MP, to update the Statement of Expectations to address the environmental, Cultural and social issues raised through this campaign to save the Upper Murrumbidgee River.
“Rivers are our lifeblood. We must stop pretending the Snowy scheme is ‘clean energy’ – there is nothing clean about restricting flows to such an extent that the Upper Murrumbidgee River is dying, smothered by silt, sand and not enough water.”
Dr. Siwan Lovett
Managing Director, Australian River Restoration Centre
So what needs to happen?
For us to change the future of the Upper Murrumbidgee, it’s critical that we bring the management of the headwaters of one of our largest and most significant rivers into line with contemporary best practice management and governance.
This will ensure that Snowy Hydro has legal obligations to care for the people, communities and ecosystems downstream of its operations, and which depend on a healthy and flowing river.