The Victorian Water Accounts
The Victorian Water Accounts provide a snapshot of the year in water across Victoria. The Accounts are an authoritative and comprehensive record of water availability and use. They cover different sources of water, including surface water, groundwater, recycled water and desalinated water. The Accounts demonstrate Victoria’s compliance with its water entitlement framework, and help to make better informed water-related decisions.
The Accounts consolidate information from many sources including rural and urban water corporations, the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA), the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, the Victorian Environmental Water Holder, the Essential Services Commission, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, Alpine Resorts Victoria, power generators and other major users of water. This information is recorded in the Victorian Water Register.
All information in the Accounts is provided for the water year (the period from 1 July to 30 June).
We've provided some detail on the site reports below - click the down arrows to expand each report type.
Site structure
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There are 3 reports*: Year in Water, Water for Traditional Owners and Water for the Environment.
The Year in Water report provides an overview of Victoria's water resource story for the year. It includes a:
- message from the Minister
- rainfall and climate summary for the year
- summary of available water and the response to availability
- summary of overall water use and the volume of entitlements
- summary of evapotranspiration.
The Water for Traditional Owners report provides information on:
- water entitlements held by Traditional Owners
- other access to water by Traditional Owners
- water information for Traditional Owners.
The Water for the Environment report provides information on:
- managed environmental water
- environmental entitlements and use.
* For the 2022-23 Accounts, an additional report was provided to showcase the timeline for 20 years of the Victorian Water Accounts.
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There are 3 statewide reports: Surface Water, Groundwater and Water Supply.
The Statewide Surface Water and Groundwater reports provide information on:
- available water and the response to availability
- water use
- entitlements and compliance
- trade.
The Statewide Water Supply report provides information on:
- urban water restrictions on use
- water deliveries via water supply systems
- recycled water availability and use.
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The Accounts contains reporting on surface water, groundwater and water supply at a more local scale. This includes:
- surface water reports by river basin
- groundwater reports by groundwater catchment
- groundwater reports by groundwater management unit
- water supply reports by water corporation
- water supply reports by water supply system (e.g. individual town or irrigation system). These reports are reached indirectly through links on each water corporation report.
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The Water Explained sections summarise:
- the types of resources the Accounts report on
- which agencies have responsibilities for managing water in Victoria
- Victoria’s water entitlement and planning framework, and the way it shares available water resources
- methods used to compile the Accounts, and the key definitions and assumptions used.
The transformation journey
Since 2003-04, we have published the Accounts each year in the form of a large report (in PDF and hard copy). In 2018, we began our journey to transform the Accounts from a report into a digital resource. Following some early website iterations, user needs analysis and research, we were able to launch this comprehensive website in early 2024. This site provides users with all the information previously found in the report and previous websites in one place. Interactive data visualisations, more succinct text and easy multi-year data downloads make this a more modern and engaging way to use the Accounts.
Previously released versions of the Accounts can be found in Previous Victorian Water Accounts.
The structure has changed a bit from the Accounts prior to 2021-22. If you would like to find information equivalent to specific sections in our historical PDF report structure - go to our mapping file.
We'll continue to improve as we go along. Please get in touch at water.reporting@deeca.vic.gov.au if you have any suggestions or feedback.
