A range of vital projects designed to meet critical Murray-Darling Basin Plan targets will not be finished on time, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority's new CEO has confirmed.
Addressing the National Rural Press Club on Tuesday, Andrew McConville revealed the latest assessment of the Sustainable Diversion Limit Adjustment Mechanism (SDLAM) projects predicted a shortfall of 190–315 gigalitres by the time they were supposed to be delivered in June 2024.
"This means the authority will have no choice but to recommend to the federal water minister amended sustainable diversion limits in southern basin catchments," Mr McConville said.
These projects were put forward by basin state governments in 2017 and are supposed to deliver environmental outcomes that are equivalent to removing 605GL from the consumptive pool of water.
A number of reports, including from the Productivity Commission and the Water for the Environment Special Account, have warned the projects were at risk of not being completed.
An example is the Nyah Floodplain Management Project in northern Victoria, where the state government plans to place regulators around the floodplain, which would allow the flooding of the forest without having to raise the river height to a flood level.
In its latest report on the projects, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) said the Nyah project was capable of operating by 2024, but only if there were no delays to approvals or construction, which could include flooding and supply chain disruptions.
Other projects include changes to river operations rules.
But several projects, like the Menindee Lakes water savings project, intended to reduce evaporation and recover 105GL is "unable to be delivered" according to the MDBA's report.
"As it stands, several projects to ease constraints so the river can more easily connect with its floodplain are estimated to need another five to 10 years beyond 2024 to be finished," Mr McConville said.
"Currently, our assessment is that the SDLAM projects will most likely deliver between 290 and 415 of the 605GL required as part of the basin plan."
Mr McConville said seven of the 36 projects were considered "high risk", meaning they either would not deliver the environmental outcome that was expected in 2017 or would not be finished on time.
Many of these projects are in New South Wales but Mr McConville was reluctant to place all the blame on that state for putting the projects at risk.
"NSW is the largest state in the basin, and has the heaviest lifting to do. They have 20 of the 33 water resource plans, so that's where a lot of the work is being done."
