Sweetwaters still not providing water to Kaitāia despite $13.5m spent so far

Emergency water tanks have been used in Kaitāia during previous droughts that have left the town’s water supply low.

After many years, and $13.5 million spent so far, there’s still no date for when water from Sweetwaters aquifer - which was meant to end to Kaitāia’s water shortage issues - will be ready to drink.

At the end of January, Far North district council said water from the Sweetwater aquifer was days away from being tested in the town’s treatment plant.

However, the council has confirmed there’s still no date for when the water will be flowing out of taps in the town to ease its chronic dry weather water shortage situation.

The Sweetwaters project was supposed to ease the situation, which has seen water storage tanks put in to Kaitāia during droughts, when the Awanui River - the town’s main water source - runs low.

‘’We are still testing different combinations of our pumps and other infrastructure to achieve optimum water flows from the two bores,’’ Tanya Proctor, FNDC head of infrastructure said.

‘’This is taking longer than previously indicated in our December media response. Thorough and extended testing is a critical step in ensuring Kaitāia’s second water source provides the volume of water required by the town.’’

She said no date has been set for the permanent introduction of water from the Sweetwater bores into the Kaitāia water supply.

Proctor said the council has now invested $13.5 million on the project, but there’s no date yet for when the supply will be fully functional.

The final approved budget for the scheme is $13,630,171. This includes $3m provided by the Provincial Growth Fund.

The council first started to explore getting waters from the Sweetwater aquifer in 2010 when then-Far North Mayor Wayne Brown made an agreement with avocado grower Tony Hayward.

At that stage it was estimated that the project would cost around $2.6m, but by October 2020, the cost had ballooned to an estimated $15.3m.

One production well [PW1] was drilled at Sweetwater in 2010 and an initial concept design was then produced in 2011.

But there was no further activity on the project until 2019 when FNDC passed a resolution to confirm the Sweetwater bore site as the preferred option for an additional supply for Kaitāia.

The scope of the project at that stage was defined as; installation of two water bores into the deep shellbed aquifer at the Sweetwater site; a primary sedimentation structure, 125m3 buffer tanks, 60L/s booster pump station, power supply and telemetry at the Sweetwater site; construction of 14.2km of new DN315 water main from the bores to the existing Kaitāia water treatment plant (WTP).

Excluded from the scope were any infrastructure changes required to the existing Kaitāia WTP to ensure that both aquifer and Awanui River water could be treated and blended.

Council chief executive Guy Holroyd said back in January that the project to access raw water from the aquifer at Sweetwater was launched following the 2020 drought that hit Northland.

‘’In just three years, we have drilled new bores, come to agreement with several landowners to allow a pipeline to cross their land and built that pipeline to Kaitāia,’’ Holroyd said.

Holroyd said the site blessing in June 2022 was to celebrate infrastructure construction being completed.

‘’The next critical project step was to implement the commissioning plan of the Sweetwater supply. After considerable discussion over options, in late September 2023 the council instructed its Three Waters alliance partner, Far North Waters, to proceed with a plan to introduce Sweetwater groundwater to the Kaitāia water treatment plant at intervals,’’ Holroyd said.

‘’This would help to confirm the production capacity of the water bores and Kaitāia WTP requirements to blend bore water with existing raw water taken from the Awanui River.’’

When asked why it had taken so long to get the system up and running, when it was supposed to have been supplying water in May last year, he said operational commissioning needed to be determined and tested.

There has also been a collapse of bores at Sweetwater, and issues with silica in the water, but the council’s plan would confirm the treatment and commissioning of the supply.

The council said compensation had been paid to several landowners where pipelines had to cross, but would not say how much.