Fish kill: Scientists want 400GL reserved in Menindee Lakes to save Lower Darling

SCIENTISTS investigating the Lower Darling fish kills have called for at least 400 gigalitres of water to be reserved in the Menindee Lakes for flushing flows.

Utter carnage: Dead fish in the Menindee weir pool in late January. Officials found hundreds of thousands of dead fish in the Menindee weir pool and neighbouring waterways, including bony herring, golden perch and carp. Picture: AAP

SCIENTISTS investigating the Lower Darling fish kills have called for at least 400 gigalitres of water to be reserved in the Menindee Lakes for flushing flows.

“At least 400GL of accessible water should be kept in storage in the upper Menindee Lakes as drought contingency in support of local needs,” the report released today states.

The call falls into line with appeals from Lower Darling irrigators and the NSW former Water Commissioner David Harriss who told The Weekly Times in mid-January that a 400GL reserve was critical to the river’s health.

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But the Academy of Sciences also recognised holding a 400GL reserve would drastically reduce the water savings the NSW Government hoped to recover from reconfiguring Menindee’s four lakes, so that just two are used for storage, saving up to 106GL and retaining a reserve of just 80GL.

The academy wants to turn NSW’s to put a greater focus on the environment, rather than water savings.

“There needs to be a Menindee Lakes restoration project, not an efficiency project, focusing on sustainable environmental management of the lakes system, guided by environment and water agency focusing on restoring wetting and drying regimes for Lakes Menindee and Cawndilla,” the Academy fish kill report states.

“This would reduce the amount of water saved, requiring adjustment to Sustainable Diversion Limits.”

But as The Weekly Times argued last month, any reduction in the 106GL water savings from reconfiguring the lakes would have to be made up by taking more water from other irrigation zones, mainly in southern NSW and northern Victoria.

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The academy’s report also argued more water needed to be recovered from Queensland and NSW’s share of the northern basin, and called for the repeal of last year’s amendments to the basin plan that cut the region’s contribution to the environment by 70GL, from 390GL to 320GL.

The academy’s report called on parliament to repeal the Northern Basin Amendment decision to cut the northern basin target by 70 GL a year, given:

INSUFFICIENT scientific evidence for over-recovery of environmental water;

PEER-REVIEWED scientific evidence of ongoing decline of river ecosystems, including Ramsar-listed wetland sites, and superficial socio-economic analyses not adequately incorporating long-term costs on ecosystem services; and

BROAD community concern, including from traditional owners and Lower Darling and Menindee communities.

In a bid to recover more water the academy also called on parliament to repeal 1500GL on government water buyouts “from willing irrigators to recover water at the least cost to taxpayers”.

“Our review of the fish kills found there isn’t enough water in the Darling system to avoid catastrophic outcomes,” the academy’s expert panel chair ANU Professor Craig Moritz said

“The best possible scenario is water in the Darling all the way to the bottom and in most years. We are hopeful that this could be achieved if the panel’s recommendations are implemented.”