Pumping water from Roxburgh to Lake Roxburgh Village at the Roxburgh dam is considered by the Roxburgh Community Board to be the best solution to ease water supply problems and meet new drinking water standards, although the pipeline will be expensive.
The board yesterday heard the pipeline would cost $600,000 and a second funding application to the Ministry of Health had been declined, as the village did not meet the new deprivation index eligibility requirements.
The ministry had already approved a grant of $38,000 for the Lake Roxburgh [Roxburgh Village] water system upgrade and the remainder would be funded through a loan expected to take 20 years to pay off.
The grant was given specifically to upgrade the supply or fix the present plant, not for the pipeline, but it is expected the grant will still be forthcoming.
"[Waitaki MP] Jacqui Dean gave assurance that [Minister of Health] Tony Ryall was OK with what we are doing," board chairman Stephen Jeffery said.
The Central Otago District Council had intended to upgrade the water systems separately and a grant of $330,000 had already been given for the Roxburgh supply upgrade.
Though the pipeline would have a high initial cost, it was expected that ongoing costs would be significantly lower than the other option, which was to upgrade the Lake Roxburgh water treatment plant at a cost of $360,000.
If the board chose to upgrade the treatment plant, the effect on water rates was expected to be $42 a year which would rise to $48 a year after 20 years to take into account the need to upgrade and because no subsidy would be available.
With the pipeline option, however, the effect was expected to be $20 a year for the 20-year duration of the loan repayments. Once the loan was paid off, that cost was expected to reduce.
This option also gave the opportunity for new water connections to be established, which the upgrade option did not provide.
The board approved the tender process for the construction which is proposed to begin early next year.
