Sydney dam levels surge after downpour, but water restrictions remain in place

A rare weather event has dumped huge amounts of rain and topped up dams, but is it enough to lift water restrictions?

After Sydney copped a drenching at the weekend, there are calls to relax water restrictions put in place in December — but the government is yet to respond.

The east coast low that brought hundreds of millimetres of rain to the NSW coast has helped top up Sydney’s main water source.

Rapidly dropping levels at the two-million-megalitre Warragamba Dam in recent months had many concerned about the security of Sydney’s water supply.

Water levels are up at Warragamba Dam. Picture: Jenny Evans/Getty Images

The NSW government brought in level-two water restrictions in December to help lower demand as the water level dropped dangerously close to the 33.4 per cent historical low from 2007.

The hundreds of millimetres of rain that fell across Sydney and surrounds in the past few days has now begun flowing through the catchment areas and have caused the dam levels to jump significantly.

Warragamba Dam has risen 26.4 per cent in the past week and is now 69.3 per cent full.

Water is still flowing into the dam and it is expected to rise about 70 per cent by the end of the week.

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Water restrictions remain in place.

Water NSW said there were now 1.4 million megalitres of water in the dam, enough to meet Sydney’s average daily demand for almost three and a half years.

Demand is also supplemented with treated water from a desalination plant at Kurnell, which can pump out 250,000 megalitres a day at full tilt.

Whether that plant remains operating beyond the end of next month is still to be decided by the government.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean the water restrictions will be relaxed.

That decision lies with NSW Water Minister Melinda Pavey, who has yet to make up her mind about whether the restrictions should be lifted.

The Department of Primary Industries confirmed to news.com.au yesterday that the rain hadn’t been enough to break the drought in more inland areas.

“The rainfall has provided an excellent building block for the first stage of drought recovery, but more rain is needed over the coming months for long-term recovery. Drought recovery will not happen instantly and it will take time to understand the overall benefit from the rainfall,” the department said.