Dear Members,

This newsletter provides Members with an update on key water issues affecting CICL and its Members’ businesses.

In this month's newsletter -

Department of Climate Change Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW)

Allocation announcements

15/07/2025

High Security 95%

General Security 9%

Groundwater 100%
(Lower Murrumbidgee)

2025-26 CICL announcement and offers

Member benefit 10%

Water allocation update –NSW – DCCEEW released a water allocation update on Tuesday 15 July 2025. It is here here. The next allocation announcement will be published at 2.30pm on Friday 1st August.

Waterways is open for 2025/2026 Water Statements, but still closed for water orders.

http://www.colyirr.com.au

T: 1300 850 105

Inter-valley trade (IVT)

Up-to-date information on the IVT is here.

You can register for WaterNSW IVT alerts here.

CICL Board Elections

CICL will call for nominations from Monday 18 August 2025 for one member director due to the retirement by rotation of Denise Kelly.

Denise, our Deputy Chair, has advised she intends to renominate.

The call for nominations closes at 12 noon on Thursday 18 September 2025.

Member benefit

CICL has announced a member benefit of 10 percent of delivery entitlements at no cost to members.

This offer is for active members who are financial as of Thursday 31 July 2025.

To be financial, CICL must have received payment for all your 2024/25 invoices, or you must have entered into a payment arrangement to the satisfaction of CICL, before Thursday 31 July 2025. Please contact Reception T: 02 6954 4003 prior to 31 July 2025, if a payment arrangement is required.

The megalitre amount of the member benefit will be added to Water Statements after 31 July 2025.

2024/25 Invoices

Your invoices are due for payment by Thursday 31 July 2025. Unless satisfactory payment arrangements have been made prior, failure to pay will result in the suspension of water supply and you will not be eligible for the member benefit. Failure to pay or enter into an arrangement by ANY member of an SFU will result in the suspension of water supply to ALL members of the SFU.

When paying your invoice please allow sufficient time for your payment to be received by CICL. We recommend payment is effected by Monday 28 July 2025 to ensure that funds are cleared in time.

Schedule of Charges

CICL has provided all members with our Schedule of Charges for 2025/26. The Schedule is produced to meet the requirements of the Water Charge Rules 2010 (Cth) and can be found here.

The ready reckoner for 2025/26 will be updated again after the Water Administration Ministerial Corporation charges are finalised in late September.

Water Use limit 2025/2026 water season

Customers are advised the total farm water use (including on-farm bores) should not exceed 9ML/ha for the 2025/26 season unless they have entered into

Water Use Agreements with CICL.

Please contact Keith Thompson via reception on T: 02 6954 4003 for further information.

Active Membership

The requirements for active membership of CICL are described in Rule 9.2 of CICL Rules. An abridged summary of the key requirements for active membership are below. To be considered active, a member:

Must own or lease a landholding with CICL which water can be delivered to by CICL infrastructure.
Hold a minimum of 10 delivery entitlements and a minimum of 10 shares.
Use or trade or undertake to use or trade a minimum of 10 ML from the member’s water account each year.
Pay or undertake to pay invoices in a manner acceptable to CICL.
Not be in breach of CICL’s water supply rules.

If you require more information, please contact the Company Secretary via reception on T: 02 6954 4003.

Operations Update

Winter Works Program

This year’s winter works program has been extremely productive, thanks to a combination of detailed planning, highly skilled staff and contractors, and a remarkable absence of wet weather (not great for farming, but helpful for construction work!). Our team has completed the major works budgeted for this year, as well as getting a head start on some jobs budgeted for the new financial year. These works will help improve CICL’s delivery capacity, increase the longevity of our infrastructure, and improve safety for our operations and maintenance staff. The below photos provide a snapshot of some of the projects completed.

*Tubbo Offtake – seals fitted to refurbished gates.*

*Boona 8 Regulator, Flumegates™ and downstream walk way installed.*

Access to Waterways

Our annual software maintenance has been successfully completed and water statements for the 2025/26 season are now available on Waterways.

You can access Waterways via the CICL website at www.colyirr.com.au.

Water Operations start of season

To assist with planning the commencement of water delivery for the 2025/26 season, please contact Water Operations to discuss your water order requirements.

We expect water will be available for delivery to customers in mid-August, following completion of winter works. The exact timing will depend on customer demand, so please keep Water Operations updated with your plans by phoning the office T: 02 6954 4003 or M: 0427 544 269.

Crop forms

Before a water order can be placed, members are required to submit a crop form with intended crop types and areas per farm. These details can be updated at any time throughout the season if your plans change.

The crop form is available here or from reception on T: 02 6954 4003.

The completed crop form can be submitted via email to enquiries@colyirr.com.au or in person at reception.

EXTERNAL ISSUES

Member meeting

CICL has DCCEEW and WaterNSW attending a breakfast meeting starting at 8.30am on Thursday 21 August at the Coleambally Club.

DCCEEW will provide a water allocation update and WaterNSW will provide a Murrumbidgee water operations update. Please “save the date.”

Water availability update

Points to note in DCCEEW’s Water Allocation Statement include assumed carryover equal to 16 percent of general security entitlements. The resource assessment includes 744GL of assumed future inflows, including releases from Snowy Hydro. The assessment also details the volume in held environmental water accounts.

Annual water allocation account limits reminders

The water account rules which members need to be aware of are:

Carryover is limited to 30 percent of general security water entitlements.
Carryover plus the announced allocation cannot exceed 100 percent of general security water entitlements. Member benefit and allocation trade in is in addition to the 100 percent.
General security water entitlement holders can access off-allocation water in supplementary events when the announced allocation for general security is less than 70 percent. Any off-allocation usage is included in the account limit of 100 percent unless History of Use (HOU) supplementary water is held.
If you have used off-allocation water and an increase to general security announced allocation would cause you to breach the account limit of 100 percent, the off-allocation usage above the account limit is converted to normal (non-supplementary) usage.
HOU supplementary water holders can access off-allocation water in supplementary events up to the volume of their HOU.
Supplementary water is not available against high security water entitlement holders or delivery entitlements.

During a supplementary event, only orders from farms with general security water entitlement will be considered supplementary use. Orders from those farms with high security water entitlement, G class water entitlement, or delivery entitlement only will be using allocation and must have the water available in their account before ordering.

IPART WaterNSW Final Determination

IPART made its final determination for WaterNSW at the end of June. CICL updated its Schedule of Charges to reflect the final determination.

IPART’s final determination is a one-year determination, with preparation for the next determination commencing almost immediately.

The final determination increased WaterNSW charges by 8.2 percent including a 5.8 percent increase plus 2.4 percent CPI.

CICL’s view is a number of important issues need to be resolved prior to the next determination to avoid the pass through of unsustainable cost increases onto water users. These include cost shares between water users and government for public good activities and the WaterNSW operating model.

Water Management Legislation Amendment Bill

Minister Jackson has introduced a Bill to the Legislative Assembly here, which will provide the Natural Resource Access Regulator (NRAR) and the Minister with increased powers.

The Bill means a lower standard of proof required for determining breaches, increased penalties for infringements and greater Ministerial power over decisions. The Bill also allows NRAR to use its new powers retrospectively.

NSWIC will lead our response to this Bill.

Basin Plan Evaluation Launched

The MDBA has released its Basin Plan evaluation, the MDBA’s media release is here.

The evaluation is a major step in the legislated process for the Review of the Murray Darling Basin Plan which is due by December 2026. Please find the National Irrigators’ Council media release here, with the headline:

‘MDBA declares ‘game changing’ positive results for the Basin but sends a wakeup call - we need to move beyond 'just adding water'

Voluntary Water purchases - EOI 1 Progress Report

DCCEEW released a progress report on its Water Purchase Program on Friday 4 July, here. Key points to note are:

160GL was offered with about half of the responses potentially value for money.
The volume offered from within the CICL area was less than 5GL with less than 5GL considered potentially value for money.
No decisions to purchase have been made, with applicants given the opportunity to adjust or withdraw their proposal.

Water Markets Intermediaries Code and Statutory Trust Accounting Framework

The new obligations for water brokers have commenced, with several stages until full implementation from 1 October 2025. These changes place new obligations on water market intermediaries, more information is here.

Improving the operation of IVT

WaterNSW and Victoria’s DEECA have released a consultation paper on improving access to water allocation trade between zones in the southern Murray Darling Basin, here. Responses to the draft framework are requested via a survey here and due by Saturday 17 August.

Members with an interest in the processing of IVTs may be interested in responding to this survey.

Murrumbidgee Constraints Relation Business Case

NSW DCCEEW has released the constraints relaxation business case for the Murrumbidgee here.

The recommended flow rate is to increase the upper environmental flow limit to 40,000ML/day at Wagga Wagga, with flows at this level not expected to commence until after 2031 and subject to continuing Australian Government support. CICL’s interest in this project is its potential contribution of 10-20GL towards the sustainable diversion limit adjustment mechanism. With the Landholder Negotiation Scheme now in place, NSW, if funded by the Australian Government can, if it chooses continue to progress its Reconnecting River Country Program in the Murrumbidgee.

NRAR crack down on Basic Landholder Rights water

Members attention is drawn to NRAR action against a landholder in northern NSW using their stock and domestic licence to mix chemicals for crop spraying. The landholder was issued with a stop work order as this use does not comply with the requirements of a basic rights water supply work. This is an issue for many farmers across the state, and NSWIC is supporting the efforts of NSW Farmers to advocate for a solution to be expedited.

Conclusion

If you are interested in nominating for the member director position arising from the retirement by rotation of Denise Kelly, please note the deadline and also reach out to our Company Secretary for more information about what is involved.

I cannot stress enough the need for you to ensure your 2024/25 invoice (and any outstanding other invoices) are fully paid by Thursday 31 July 2025. If CICL does not have cleared funds in our account on 31 July, or a signed payment agreement with CICL in place by this date, members who otherwise meet the active membership criteria will not receive the member benefit.

I also encourage you to respond to our requests for information about your likely water demand in August.

Please place the Member meeting date in your diary, Thursday 21 August. This meeting will be a valuable opportunity to be updated on both water availability and Murrumbidgee operations. CICL will also provide an operations update.

I look forward to talking to members at this meeting.

Julian Speed

CEO

CICL Update July 2025