Landowners in the South West with property lying in the path of the Water Corporation’s proposed 110-kilometre Yarragadee water pipeline received notice this month of the corporation’s intention to clear a 20-metre wide corridor through paddocks.
The underground pipeline is part of the corporation’s plan to extend the Integrated Water Supply Scheme into the South West to access groundwater from the Yarragadee Aquifer. Extending from the Stirling Trunk main, about five kilometers north of Harvey, to a borefield and water treatment plant near Jarrahwood, the pipeline alignment is designed to minimise the impact on state forest areas while avoiding wetlands and areas of major mineralisation.
All 131 affected owners will be visited individually by corporation representatives over a period of three weeks beginning mid August to discuss any issues or concerns the owners may have with the impact of the pipeline.
Water Corporation South West regional business manager Chris Elliot said the corporation would negotiate easements in order to protect the pipeline, providing it with a minimal interest in the land to be registered on the owners’ certificate of title.
“Landowners will be compensated for the loss of their productive land, with payments for loss of income and the value of the easement itself to be negotiated,” Mr Elliot said.
A 15-metre wide easement is required to allow future access to the pipeline and independent property valuations will be arranged to assess the land’s market value and the value of compensation.
Mr Elliot said the proposed route had already avoided major constraints including forests but it was inevitable that the 1,400mm pipeline cut through private land because it could not be bent too much.
Detailed environmental, geotechnical and anthropological surveys are scheduled to start in September to determine a final route and a sustainability panel will provide advice to government later this year.
Mr Elliot said landowners would be subject to a compulsory acquisition process under the Land Administration Act 1997.
Up to 45 gigalitres of water could be pumped annually from the aquifer to service more than 1.6 million people in the upper South West, Perth to Mandurah region, central Wheatbelt and Goldfields.
Subject to government approval, construction of the pipeline in farming areas will likely occur over the summer periods of 2007-08 and 2008-09.
