At Seqwater we believe potential risks from land use activities can be reduced through the application of appropriate policy and planning across our catchments.
Most dams are located in open catchments – making it imperative to coexist with a variety of urban and rural land uses.Seqwater strives for positive improvements in existing land use planning, development controls, and land management processes for the enhancement of water quality protection and water productivity from the catchments.
We interact with, and in many ways depend on, a wide variety of stakeholders that include local governments, individual and traditional landholders, and several state government agencies involved in various aspects of water and land management.
Seqwater publishes development guidelines as an important reference for developers and determining authorities as well as a range of other materials designed to encourage sustainable catchments, urban water management and the protection of water quality.
Seqwater has also devised a Wastewater Balance Calculator to preserve water quality in unsewered catchment areas. This tool assists Councils, wastewater treatment system designers and residents in calculating a sustainable area for the on-site disposal of treated effluent.
Planning activity undertaken by Seqwater to ensure sustainable water quality and productive catchments includes:
- Managing development through land use planning and development assessment to ensure development is planned and undertaken sustainably to protect water quality.
- Undertaking catchment-integrated risk assessments and developing innovative solutions to mitigate these risks.
- Collaborating with local governments and regulatory agencies regarding development and activities within the catchments. This includes the promotion of riparian buffer lands to enhance water quality in waterways and storages.
- Developing tools and resources that inform and support catchment development.
- Participating in regional planning forums with regulators and the community to promote and inform catchment management processes.
Managing development
Seqwater works closely with local Councils to ensure that any development proposed in a water supply catchment area will not create adverse impacts on raw water quality. As part of Seqwater’s role, under the Sustainable Planning Act 2009, we may assess a development application as:
• A Concurrence Agency for development in a Declared Catchment Area; or
• Provide Third Party Advice for other development located within the development planning buffer zone.
For more information please see the table below, and click on the links to access relevant information.
| Status | Types of Development | Catchment Maps
|
Assessment Guideline |
| Concurrence Agency
(refer Schedule 7, Tables 2 & 3 of the Sustainable Planning Regulation 2009)
|
Development located in a Declared Catchment Area involving any of the following:
• Reconfiguration of a Lot if any lot created is less than 16ha
• Establishment or expansion of an on-site waste water treatment system, or
• Any other development other than an Environmentally Relevant Activity as defined by the Environmental Protection Act;
for the purposes of preserving water quality in catchment areas.
|
|
Guideline F10 - Policy & Code for Preserving Water Quality in Declared Catchment Areas |
Third Party Advice (refer S256 of the Sustainable Planning Act 2009)
|
All development that could impact upon water quality located within Seqwater’s Development Planning Buffer Zones, specifically:
• Material Change of Use
• Reconfiguring a Lot
• Plumbing & Drainage (e.g. on-site wastewater systems), and
• Recreational Activities.
|
Drinking Water Supply Catchments |
Seqwater Development Guidelines 2008 |
For further information contact enviroplanner@seqwater.com.au.