If you live in Tamworth, Moonbi or Kootingal, this plan is the council's answer to the question the 2017 to 2020 drought left behind: what happens next time. The report to councillors says that at the end of that drought, given what was left in Chaffey Dam and demand under severe restrictions, the three towns would have run out of water in less than two years, and that carting water in was ruled out because it is not feasible at the volume needed. Restrictions ran for 820 days, from 7 January 2019 to 6 April 2021.

The council is asked on 27 October to place the Draft Tamworth Water Security Plan on public exhibition for a period of not less than 28 days, then to receive a further report on the submissions. Nothing in the plan is adopted on 27 October.

The risk the plan puts a number on

Level 5 is the emergency tier: no town water on lawns or gardens, no filling or topping up pools, and vehicle washing limited to windows and number plates. The plan says the NSW Government's hydrology models put Tamworth in that position about once every 14 years at current demand, and that As our demand grows, within the allocation we are paying for, the likelihood of emergency L5 restrictions increases to once every four years. The council holds 16,400 ML a year of town water entitlement on the Peel and uses 10,200 ML now; the report's ultimate demand estimate, about 50 years of growth at 1% a year, is also 16,400 ML.

The target it proposes is emergency restrictions no more frequently than once every fifty years, or once in a generation. To get there, the plan says Tamworth needs to be able to reach about 10 gigalitres a year from somewhere other than Chaffey Dam, which it calls the city's one primary storage, though not every year.

How it got to Keepit

The council started from 38 options and filtered them, using the $1.3 billion estimate for a new Dungowan Dam as its cost benchmark. Its reasons for setting the main alternatives aside, all from the report and the plan:

The options and why the plan set them aside

  • GroundwaterA groundwater study found it unlikely that any supply could be delivered to, or found close to, TamworthSet aside
  • Recycled waterThe state's advanced treatment plant business case is with the government; the report calls recycled water a demand reduction tool, not rainfall independentNot a source
  • Manning River transferA 1 GL weir on the Barnard River; the plan estimates over a billion dollars and decades to a decision, and says it does not meet the level of serviceSet aside
  • Off-river storage, up to 10 GLFed from the Peel at Paradise Weir; the plan says it does not meet the level of serviceSet aside
  • Pipeline from Split Rock DamSimilar cost to Keepit, a 1,650 km² catchment and a mean inflow of 2.8Not chosen
  • Pipeline from Keepit DamA 5,700 km² catchment and a mean inflow of 18.6; the plan says it meets the level of service with the right allocation processes in placePreferred
From item 7.2 of the business paper (source 1, pages 41 to 44) and the draft plan (source 2, pages 14 and 15). Mean inflow is as the plan's storage table prints it, citing the Bioregional Assessments; the table gives no unit. Chaffey's figures in the same table are a 420 km² catchment and 3.0.

Between the two dams, the plan says that Given that both augmentations are a very similar cost, and the dams are managed as one source, connecting to Keepit Dam is the preferred option. Neither the report nor the plan gives a cost for the pipeline.

The plan's timing is two triggers. Planning starts now, because an appropriate planning phase is estimated to be at least three years and, with no change to how it is managed, Chaffey Dam can fall from full to critical levels in less than three years. Construction would follow only if Chaffey falls to a trigger, which the plan says can be as low as 20%, allowing two years to build.

What the state heard about the same option

The state has been running its own $3 million business case on four options, the Tamworth Intervalley Pipelines and Off-River Storages Project: the off-river storage, the Manning transfer, and pipelines from Keepit or Split Rock to the Calala treatment plant. The council's plan says the government is yet to publish the business case, however council are in agreement with the option identified as providing the best value for money. It does not say which option that is. The project's page, last updated 14 May 2026, gives the second quarter of 2026 to finalise the business case.

In May 2026 the department published what it heard in consultation. Its summary of feedback from the broader community reads: Options 3 and 4 were less supported, with particular concern about downstream impacts from Option 3 (Keepit pipeline). The community preferred the Manning transfer, then the off-river storage: the two options the council's plan rules out. Under equity and fairness, the report records that Significant concerns were raised about the potential reallocation of water from smaller or downstream communities to support Tamworth, especially in relation to the Keepit option. The department's response is that a thorough hydrological analysis was done in the preliminary business case, and that further hydrology on downstream impacts would be part of any full business case before an investment decision.

The council's report answers the downstream point this way: Tamworth is in the same valley. The storages are managed as one source and the Murray–Darling Basin cap includes the Peel, so the impact is effectively already there. The plan adds that operational optimisation is a process the NSW Government will have to undertake to ensure impacts are minimised. Its implementation list includes Water Sharing Plan Impacts and amendments. The plan also says this plan is not asking for additional water: the council's case is that Tamworth should grow within the 16,400 ML it already pays for.

Who pays

The report's financial implications are two sentences: The solutions required to solve water security in Tamworth are not currently funded. Funding from Federal and State Governments will be required. The council would advocate for the state to accept its level of service and concur with the plan.

The same business paper shows how far a built pipeline can sit from a usable one. Item 7.1 says the Chaffey Dam pipeline, which the state built during the last drought, ran for about six weeks in 2020 before rain lifted Chaffey above its 20% operating trigger, and has not operated since it was used to commission the new Dungowan pipeline. The report says regulators advised that the drought-era exemptions could not be extended once the drought ended, and that WaterNSW has since confirmed approvals exist to run it for maintenance. Councillors are asked to write to the Minister for Water and the Member for Tamworth asking that the long-term approval be finalised as soon as possible; WaterNSW, the report says, will set a decision point in mid-2027 on funding and on whether approvals can be accelerated.

Our view

This plan does what many don't: it names the risk in numbers, sets a target, and fixes a trigger before the next drought rather than in the middle of it. Its own pull-quote says the point is that decisions aren't being made in times of great stress, and that is right.

But the choice rests on two things outside the council's hands. One is a state business case the public has not seen, which the council says it agrees with. The other is the valley downstream. The report's answer, that the Basin cap already includes the Peel so the impact is already there, is an argument about how the water is counted. The concern the state recorded is about reallocation: water moving from smaller or downstream communities to Tamworth, and on that the plan hands the work to the NSW Government. Its own modelling says the pipeline meets the target with the right allocation processes in place, which is the same question in other words. The exhibition is the moment for irrigators and towns below Keepit to put their case on the council's record, and the Chaffey pipeline next door on the agenda is a reminder that the approvals are as hard as the pipe.

What happens next

The dates in the papers

  • May 2026The state publishes its What We Heard report on the four options.
  • Tuesday 27 October 2026Council decides whether to exhibit the draft plan for at least 28 days.
  • After exhibitionA further report on submissions, then a decision on adoption.
  • Mid-2027WaterNSW's decision point on the Chaffey Dam pipeline's long-term approval.
From item 7.2 (source 1, pages 35 and 44), item 7.1 (source 1, page 34) and the What We Heard report (source 4).

We will report the council's decision of 27 October, and when the plan goes on exhibition we will say how to make a submission. We will also report the state's business case when it is published.

Sources

Method. Researched and drafted with AI, straight from the primary sources below. Software matched 9 quotations exactly against our stored copies of their sources. How The Current works.

  1. Tamworth Regional Council, Business Paper, Ordinary Council Meeting, 27 October 2026 (PDF, read 23 October 2026; page numbers are the paper's own): item 7.2 Tamworth Water Security Plan, with the recommendation, the drought history, demand tables, level of service, options review, preferred solution, triggers and financial implications (pages 35 to 45); item 7.1 Chaffey Dam Pipeline Operation (pages 32 to 34).
  2. Tamworth Regional Council, Annexures, 27 October 2026, Part 5 (PDF, read 23 October 2026): Annexure 1 to item 7.2, the draft Tamworth Water Security Plan 2026 (council pages 1505 to 1524): allocation, demand and entitlement (plan page 6, council page 1510), L5 likelihood and the 10 GL need (plan page 8, council page 1512), the state business case and the options (plan page 14, council page 1518), the Keepit preference, storage table and triggers (plan page 15, council page 1519), and that the plan is not asking for additional water (plan page 16, council page 1520). The plan is a scanned image; we read it page by page.
  3. NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, Tamworth Intervalley Pipelines and Off-River Storages Project (web page, updated 14 May 2026, read 23 October 2026): the four options and the timeline.
  4. The same department, Tamworth Intervalley Pipelines and Off-River Storages Project: What We Heard (PDF, PUB26/294, May 2026, read 23 October 2026): broader community preferences (page 10) and the equity and downstream theme with the department's response (page 12).

How we did this

We downloaded the 27 October business paper and the fifth annexure file and read item 7.2, its draft plan and item 7.1 in full. The draft plan has no text layer, so we read each page as an image and checked every figure we use against the page. Where the report and the plan differ we have said which we used: the report's Table 1 gives current demand as 10,200 ML a year and its Table 3 as 10,000 ML; we use 10,200 ML, which the plan also prints. We have not seen the state's preliminary business case, which is unpublished, and we do not know which option it identifies. We did not contact the council or the department for this piece. The “our view” section is opinion based on the documents described.