Coliban Water's $85M infrastructure upgrade secures Bendigo's water future

Coliban Water has commenced an $85 million water infrastructure investment program that will upgrade the pipeline network connecting Bendigo's water treatment plant to the distribution system, replace ageing service reservoirs in three locations, and install new smart metering infrastructure across the network that will reduce distribution losses and enable active demand management during dry periods.

The investment follows the Strategic Asset Management Review that Coliban Water completed in 2024, which identified the aging infrastructure in the 1980s-era pipeline network as a medium-term reliability risk that warranted accelerated replacement ahead of the failure events that the condition assessment projected within a 15-20 year timeframe.

Coliban Water managing director Matt Doolan said the investment represented the largest capital program in the authority's history, noting that Bendigo's growing population — now approaching 130,000 and projected to reach 145,000 by 2030 — increased the importance of network resilience as the volume of customers dependent on the infrastructure grew with each development approval.

The smart metering component of the program will replace approximately 55,000 water meters across the distribution area, providing hourly consumption data that enables Coliban Water to identify leak events on the customer side of the meter and alert property owners to water losses that would otherwise accumulate undetected over extended periods.

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