Water Quality

Council provides clean, safe drinking water as this core service is essential to the health of our communities. Our focus is on improving the water quality through water treatment plant upgrades to comply with New Zealand Drinking Water Standards (2008) and ensure we are complying with our resource consents.

The Ministry of Health sets ‘New Zealand Drinking Water Standards’ (NZDWS) to ensure that safe drinking water is available to everyone. The NZDWS define the minimum standards for drinking water in New Zealand, and the water the Council treats and supplies needs to meet those standards. We started upgrading water suppliers and water treatment facilities five years ago in order to meet these requirements.

Public Health Management Plans for the Matamata, Te Aroha and Morrinsville water supplies have been approved.

There are six water supply schemes in the district:

• Three larger supplies for Matamata (including Waharoa), Morrinsville and Te Aroha
• Three small schemes in Te Poi, Tahuna and Hinuera.

There are eight treatment plants and approximately 341 kilometres of water pipes. Water is supplied 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which means we operate and maintain equipment, machinery and backup facilities, and train staff to respond rapidly in the event of a problem.

In 2013/14, Council upgraded existing reticulation pumps at the Burwood Road Water Treatment Plant to improve the flow of water in to the reticulation network. The cost was $35,000. A 148 metre deep replacement bore was drilled to supply the Tahuna community at a cost of $49,000. A backup generator was installed at the Tawari Street Water Treatment Plant. The backup generator will ensure that Council can continue to supply water to the Waharoa community in the event of a prolonged power outage.

A new bore is currently being drilled at Waharoa to reduce the demand on the Matamata reticulation network.

Wastewater

Despite improvements on the metering of discharges and efforts by large industry to reduce the volume they discharge to Council treatment plants, there is a general trend of an increase in the quantity of sewage treated by Council. This trend correlates to an increase in the consumption of water over the same period. This trend is likely to be the result of an increasing population. This includes the increase from 2009/10 to 2010/11, which is due to the sewerage connection to Tahuna and Waharoa. The figures for the quantity of sewage treated in 2017/18 and 2018/19 were not available at the time of writing.

In order to improve the efficiency of our district’s wastewater network Council has instigated a programme to measure and reduce stormwater infiltration to our sewerage systems.