Coliban Water storage levels have increased over the past 12 months despite the summer rainfall at Malmsbury Reservoir being less than half of the long-term average.
Manager Water Cycle Carbon and Climate Strategy Steve Healy said 55 millimetres (mm) of rain fell at Malmsbury Reservoir during summer – 79mm less than the same time last year and 70mm below the long-term average.
Coliban River storages received 2556ML of water between December and February – nearly 2000ML less than the long term average (between 1891 and 2022).
“The inflow is more representative of the inflows we have experienced in recent decades,” Mr Healy said.
“It’s typical for our storages to drop over summer and autumn as these two seasons have the lowest inflow.”
The three Coliban River catchment storages, near Kyneton, are at 88 per cent capacity with 61,451ML currently in there – 3055ML more than 12 months ago.
Coliban Water’s share of Lake Eppalock is holding 1274ML more than in 2022, with capacity at 96 per cent.
“Because of the very wet spring, including the floods in October, the catchments were very wet and this resulted in stream flows remaining high much later in the year than usual,” Mr Healy said.
“Therefore, our storages remained full for much longer in the year than usual.”
Further information on our water storage data is online at www.coliban.com.au
Last updated on 10 Mar 2023