It is near a year since the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, Premier of New South Wales, Deputy Premier of New South Wales announced their “Billion-dollar investment in NSW dams”. The two big items are a new larger Dungowan Dam to provide water for Tamworth and raising the wall of the Wyangla Dam by 10m.
I am just wondering if shovels will hit the ground at either project before 12 months passes since the big announcement on 13th October last year. Google will find many reports and articles on the above but I am yet to see where shovels have disturbed any soil. Plenty of community consultation and prepping of EIS.
Just noticed that the NSW Water Minister Melinda Pavey on the same day as the ScoMo-Gladys big announcement put out a media release titled Every Drop Is Sacred. Not a syllable about the new dams but screeds on recycling, desalinization, praising Kurnell & waste water to tap projects. Wow it reads like the NSW Water Dept is fully captured by the GreenLeft. The NSW Water Minister reads like a fully paid up member of what I have described as the “movement for more expensive water”.
The websites for the two dams are here:
www.waternsw.com.au/projects/new-dams-for-nsw/wyangala-dam
www.waternsw.com.au/projects/new-dams-for-nsw/dungowan-dam
You are right, no shovels are yet disturbing any sods at either location. Maybe some ancillary works will start next month.
It’ll get done eventually I suppose. Meanwhile, I wonder how many billion times Covid is going to be trotted out over the next few years as an excuse for being behind on construction projects.
wazz
While Our Glad got lucky with that cruise ship stuffup (and we notice that there is still no clear line of accountability on that, just like VicGov), Gladys and her Northside Cabinet are indistinguishable from the Greens in terms of water, energy, grid power …
This is why Morrison is so vapid on these issues. The States again hold the real power and there is not one current State Govt that is not woke. As previously said, vote all you like, or not – makes no difference.
You forgot to mention “environmental flows” another weapon in the kit of the modern anti-dam brigade to wreck dams. They are happiest when our river waters flow direct to the sea.
Plenty of jobs already.
Green jobs at that!!
Preparing EISs!!!!
A year has passed now since the Prime Minister’s big “Billion-dollar investment in NSW dams” media announcement.
I wonder if a shovel has touched any dirt? It seems probably not after reading carefully the Wyangala page and Dungowan page. Here are jpg’s of the Wyangala and Dungowan “dashboards” recording the statistics of progress.
I did some searching in Questions and Replies in NSW Parliament and came across a few gems. First – the Labor Member for Cessnock – Clayton Barr asks probing questions re water supply and dams and this re progress at Wyangala and Dungowan is yet to be answered. I also turned up this gem asked in July this year where the reply shows that a few years ago the Feds took away $9.4Mill from NSW on basis they were not performing. I wonder if our Prime Minister took that into account when offering NSW a lazy ~$Billion just 13 short months ago.
We have now had over 400 days since PM Morrison made his “Billion-dollar investment in NSW dams” announcement on 13Oct2019 and this question by Cessnock Labor MP Clayton Barr and todays answer in the NSW Lower House shows NOTHING has disturbed soil anywhere. Just more EIS generation and NSW State bureaucratic process. GreenLeft bureaucrats are firmly in charge – it has been raining again – they all believe anti-dam dogmas and nothing will happen unless powerful NSW politicians start pounding the mahogany. This whole happening could easily make a plot for the TV comedy “Utopia” and the “Nation Building Authority”.