Orange City Council has recommissioned old water bores around the city in a bid to keep watering vital resources in the drought.
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OCC technical services director Ian Greenham said alternate water sources were being sought and used for trees, council work and for the Orange Aquatic Centre.
"Orange City Council is one of the largest water users in town. We've done a lot going towards ground water for those uses," he said.
"We've recommissioned old bores, we've got them licensed again.
"We're topping up the pool with bore water, most of our water used at the sewerage treatment plant for washing down is now through bore water, through the Showground bore."
Mr Greenham said a bore at the Orange cemetery was now being used to provide water for construction work.
"Around town any trees we have planted in the last five years we are still watering to try and keep them alive. Those are all being watered with bore water," he said.
We've recommissioned old bores, we've got them licensed again.
- Ian Greenham, OCC technical services director
Mr Greenham said council was also looking at water storages and potential new bores around Orange.
He said they were working on projects to increase water supply for when it rains and also to hold off the introduction of tough Level 6 restrictions for as long as possible.
"We've had some significant commitment from the state government towards the Cowra pipeline project which will run [through] Central Tablelands Water and through the existing Orange to Carcoar supply pipe," he said.
"There are also two other projects. One is to link Spring Creek dam directly to our Icely Road water treatment plant and also another stage onto the the Blackmans Swamp stormwater harvesting scheme.
"That involves similar detention basins to the wetlands to what we've got on the Ploughmans system that will help slow down the flow of water in a storm event and also allow us to harvest for longer."
He said that would provide "a tremendous boost" of an extra 700 megalitres of water as well as the existing 800 megalitres obtained from the Blackmans harvesting scheme.
"There is another stage to Blackmans as well that we're progressing on the design front. That's stage 3 which is a weir upgrade at the weir pool that we do operate the pumps from."
Council will also hold water information forums for businesses and the community at the Civic Theatre on Wednesday and Thursday this week.
The business forums are at 12.30pm-1.30pm on Wednesday and 5.30pm-7pm on Thursday while the community forums are at 5.30pm-7pm on Wednesday and 12.30pm-1.30pm on Thursday.
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