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The Waimea Dam reservoir, pictured on August 30, 2023.
The Waimea dam is performing to expectations as its reservoir is progressively filled, its operators say.
A post on a Motueka community group page this month alleged that the dam “was a quarter full and leaking”.
Waimea Water chief executive Mike Scott told the Nelson Mail there had been a “couple of teething issues”, but these had nothing to do with the dam itself.
When the diversion culvert was closed on May 26, a stop log plate, “basically a big steel plate” was put onto the front end of the culvert. A minor leak was discovered with the plate, and was fixed.
This was nothing to do with the dam, only the culvert, and the issue was swiftly rectified, Scott said.
“We don’t have any significant issues,” he said.
“The dam is doing what we expected and what we contemplated.”
Over July and August, water levels were kept at a very low level to allow an isolating valve to be installed.
BRADEN FASTIER / STUFF
Waimea Water Ltd chief executive Mike Scott at the site of the Waimea Dam.
In a statement, Waimea Water said the reservoir would be filled in stages by keeping the water level at hold points for extended periods to allow for testing and engineering measurements.
Following rainfall, water would need to be released to return the reservoir to set levels, and then when ready, the reservoir would be built up to the next hold point.
Now that the sealing concrete plug and isolating valve had been installed, Waimea Water expected to begin filling the reservoir imminently.
“With sufficient rainfall, we expect to provide water to shareholders and the community this summer,” Scott said.
The dam, a public private partnership between the Tasman District Council and Waimea Irrigators, is the first large dam to be constructed in New Zealand in 25 years.
In June, the option of retrofitting the dam with hydroelectric generators was again mooted, less than two years after hydropower preparation work was put on ice.
Its last revised cost forecast in February sat at $198.2 million. Scott said Waimea Water was not changing the budget and saw no reason at the moment for that cost forecast to change.
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