Search for water supply continues
3 February 2016
Drilling for a new bore has begun on Taylor's Hill today as Waipa District Council continue the search for a new water supply for Te Awamutu.
The test bore will be sunk by Council and ground water will be pumped for the next three days. This water will then be tested to establish the amount of water available as well as the water quality.
The pumped water will be discharged onto the neighbouring paddock and some of this may trickle down Greenhill Drive during this time. On-site contractors will be monitoring this where possible over the next few days.
The bore on Taylor's Hill is in addition to the Frontier Road bore that was sunk in December. Test results last month confirmed this bore can provide 1.2 million litres of water per day.
Two other test bores have also been sunk at Te Tahi and Pirongia in recent months however these could not supply enough water and have been discounted.
Group manager service delivery Barry Bergin said while the success of the Frontier Road bore has been great to see, investigation into other bores is vital.
The Frontier Road bore is providing a consistent amount of high quality water however we need around another 1.8 million litres of water per day to comfortably provide enough water for Te Awamutu.
A comfortable water supply is particularly important over these summer months where hot, dry weather conditions see a huge increase in water use. Last week alone, Te Awamutu used 92 million litres of water and for the district as a whole, we saw consumption rise to around 226 million litres.
Test results of the Taylor's Hill bore are expected to be available later this month.
The whole of Waipa District, Hamilton City and Waikato District are currently at water alert level 2 which means sprinklers and watering systems can only be used on alternate days (e.g. even street numbers on even days; odd street numbers on odd days) between 6- 8am and 6- 8pm.
For more information, contact: Natalie Palmer, 027 807 3174.