Singleton resident and rural landowner, Martin Fallding, has been appointed as the inaugural chairperson of the Hunter-Paterson Environmental Water Advisory Group (EWAG).
Once fully established, the Hunter-Paterson EWAG will advise the NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (the department) on using the environmental water allowance in the Hunter and Paterson regulated rivers.
The department will seek expressions of interest for membership of the Hunter-Paterson EWAG later in 2024. The group will bring together representatives from a range of interests across the region, including Aboriginal people, environmental groups, water users, and aquatic scientists. Information provided by EWAG members will contribute to decisions about environmental water management for 2025 and beyond.
The Hunter and Paterson Regulated River Water Sharing Plans provide 22 gigalitres (GL) of environmental water allowance to improve river health within the catchments. Each water year, which starts on 1 July, the environmental water allowance is credited with 20 GL of water in the upper Hunter River water storages of Glenbawn Dam and Glennies Creek Dam and 2 GL in Lostock Dam in the Paterson River sub-catchment. Any unused environmental water allowance cannot be carried forward to the next water year.
The Hunter-Paterson EWAG will be the sixth EWAG established in New South Wales and the first in a coastal river catchment. The department also works with the Snowy Advisory Committee in the Snowy and Montane rivers.
Water for the environment provides benefits such as maintaining river health, encouraging fish passage and spawning, providing river flows that maintain natural variability, and recognising Aboriginal cultural relationships to land and water.
