Winter Works to deliver number of customer benefits

Thursday 14 May, 2026

Goulburn-Murray Water (GMW) will provide more efficient and reliable water delivery to its customers when the 2026/27 irrigation season starts thanks to its 2026 Winter Works program.

The program takes place every year during the irrigation off-season from May 16 to August 14 when GMW does not have its usual water delivery obligations.

During this time, GMW undertakes key maintenance works on its water delivery network including its channels, pipelines and regulators.

This ensures the water corporation can continue to supply water in an efficient and timely manner.

GMW General Manager Infrastructure Delivery Services Alan Shea said this year's works would provide a number of benefits to customers when the 2026/27 irrigation season starts on August 15, 2026.

"A key focus of this year's program is repairing and remodelling channel banks, which will improve water delivery and flow," he said.

"We'll deliver improvements to more than 10 kilometres of channel across our network."

This year's Winter Works will focus heavily on improving GMW's existing assets to maintain reliability and future service.

This includes replacing or rehabilitating a number of ageing culverts, syphons and bridges in areas near Cohuna and Gunbower Island, Macorna and Durham Ox, Picola, Kaarimba, Strathmerton, Katamatite and Echuca.

Mr Shea said this year's program would also include about 70 kilometres of channel desilting works and the removal of weeds from a further 300 kilometres of channel.

"The desilting and weed treatment works will also improve water flow and delivery reliability to our customers," he said.

GMW will undertake its aquatic weed treatment program by using Flumioxazin (Payload), a herbicide it has used since 2021 due to its effectiveness on target weeds and overall low environmental impact.

Weeds affect water flow, promote silting and cause problems with GMW's automated gates, which can reduce the ability to deliver water to the water corporation's customers.

Mr Shea said GMW's use of drones would once again play an important role during the Winter Works period.

"We'll undertake an extensive 'hot spot' identification program using LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) technology on our drones," he said.

"This will help our teams assess more channel areas for silt build up or weed growth by identifying 'hot spot' areas across our network.

"This means we can cover more areas in a quicker timeframe."