East Gippsland Water

About the area

East Gippsland Water’s service area spans 21,000 km². It extends from Lindenow in the west through to Mallacoota in the east and north to Dinner Plain in the Victorian Alps.
Key population centres include Bairnsdale and the holiday centres of Paynesville and Lakes Entrance.
Water services are provided to roughly 25,400 customers via 9 separate water supply systems.
More information on the water corporation can be found at East Gippsland Water.

2021-22 overview

Urban deliveries

4,286 ML of urban residential and non-residential deliveries were made in 2021-22, similar to the previous year (4,692 ML in 2020-21).

Wastewater recycled at treatment plants

82% of wastewater was recycled (3,139 ML of 3,808 ML).

Water deliveries

Urban systems

East Gippsland Water operates 9 urban water supply systems, including 7 sourced from surface water, one from groundwater and one from both. Water is sourced from the East Gippland, Mitchell, Murray, Snowy and Tambo basins.

Table 1: Urban system water balance, East Gippsland Water

Area / town / system	Start volume in store (ML)	Total inflows (ML)	Outflows (ML)							End volume in store (ML)	Distribution system efficiency (%)
Area / town / system	Start volume in store (ML)	Total inflows (ML)	Urban residential deliveries	Urban non-residential deliveries	Evaporation	Passed to other systems	System losses	Unattributed outflows	Total outflows	End volume in store (ML)	Distribution system efficiency (%)
Bemm River	5	13	6	5	0	0	0	0	11	6	100%
Buchan	0	15	8	6	0	0	2	0	16	0	88%
Cann River	3	25	13	10	0	0	2	0	25	3	92%
Dinner Plain	0	67	23	13	0	0	31	0	67	0	54%
Mallacoota	49	167	87	44	33	0	19	0	183	34	72%
Mitchell System ¹	1,413	4,220	2,441	1,079	178	22	381	0	4,101	1,533	86%
Omeo	10	44	20	20	0	0	4	0	44	11	91%
Orbost System	49	606	212	283	9	0	97	0	601	53	82%
Swifts Creek	3	16	9	7	0	0	0	0	16	4	100%
Total 2021-22	1,532	5,173	2,819	1,467	220	22	536	0	5,064	1,644
Total 2020-21	1,606	5,602	3,177	1,515	247	63	673	0	5,675	1,532

Show notes

Recycled water

Water recycled at wastewater treatment plants can be used to supplement water available in river basins. Table 2 below lists the wastewater treatment plants managed by East Gippsland Water. Water discharged to the environment from treatment plants is included as an inflow to the water balance for each of the river basins.

The Essential Services Commission made some changes to recycled water data categories in 2021-22, so we have not included a comparison to 2020-21 in the table below. Click here to download the data for 2020-21. More information can be found in How we account for water supply.

Table 2: Treated wastewater produced and recycled, East Gippsland Water

Wastewater treatment plant	Class of water	Inflows to plant (ML)		Recycled water end use (ML)								Total water recycled (ML)		Discharge (ML)
Wastewater treatment plant	Class of water	Volume treated wastewater produced	Other inflow	Volume supplied to retailers	Domestic / residential	Municipal	Commercial	Industrial	Agriculture	Beneficial allocation	Within process	Total volume recycled	Total % recycled	Released to land	Ocean outfall discharge	Inland water discharge	Other outflow
Bairnsdale treatment plant ¹	C	1,480	106	0	0	0	17	0	0	1,508	0	1,524	96%	0	0	62
Bemm River treatment plant	C	10	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0%	8	0	0	1
Cann River treatment plant ²	C	21	14	0	0	0	0	0	13	0	0	13	37%	0	0	22
Dinner Plain treatment plant ³	C	40	31	0	0	0	0	0	71	0	0	71	100%	0	0	0
Lakes Entrance treatment plant ⁴	C	1,017	464	0	0	0	12	0	766	0	0	778	53%	0	0	703
Lindenow treatment plant ⁵	B	25	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	13	0	13	54%	0	0	0	11
Mallacoota treatment plant ⁶	C	156	0	0	0	0	3	0	85	0	0	88	57%	0	0	0	68
Metung treatment plant ⁷	C	99	155	0	0	0	0	0	168	0	0	168	66%	0	0	86
Omeo treatment plant ⁸	C	39	0	0	0	0	0	0	20	0	0	20	51%	0	0	12	7
Orbost treatment plant	C	326	0	0	0	0	0	0	326	0	0	326	100%	0	0	0
Paynesville treatment plant	C	595	0	0	0	0	0	0	138	0	0	138	23%	0	0	363	93
Total 2021-22		3,808	770	0	0	0	32	0	1,587	1,521	0	3,139	82%	8	0	1,248	180