Warragamba Dam Raising

My name is Janet Johnson. I live at 3 Strathdon Crescent, Blaxland NSW 2774 so I am a resident of the Blue Mountains. I declare that over the last 18 months I have donated a total of $1500 to my local members of parliament.

I am writing in relation to project number SSI-8441- the proposal to increase the height of Warragamba dam.

I am opposed to raising the dam wall for several reasons. I value the bush land of the mountains and am proud that my local government area exists within the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. It concerns me that this proposal would be a breach of Australia’s obligations under the World Heritage Convention. Many kilometres of wilderness rivers, 5,700 hectares of National Parks and 1,300 hectares of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area would be inundated.

The Commonwealth Government has estimated at least 1,500 Indigenous cultural heritage sites would also be inundated. We have a moral responsibility to preserve the cultural heritage sites that remain in Australia.

The assessment of habitat loss has been inadequate with little time spent assessing the impacts on wildlife such as the Regent Honeyeater, koalas, emus and platypuses. This wildlife habitat has recently been devastated by the fires of the summer of 2019/2020.

The engineering firm which undertook the environmental and cultural assessments has previously been banned from working on World Bank projects in some countries and has a poor record of liaising with Indigenous populations.Surely for a project of this scale and importance a company with an impeccable reputation should have been used.

No modelling of the stated flood and economic benefits of the project are outlined in the assessment which has been broadly criticised by experts such as the Former NSW SES Dep. Commissioner and flood expert, Chas Keys.

The NSW Government plans to house 134,000 new residents on the Hawkesbury-Nepean floodplain over the next 30 years, facilitated in part by the dam raising. Western Sydney is already suffering the effects of a combination of overcrowding and a lack of services to cater for the needs of its population.

I urge you to abandon this project which is totally inappropriate and will cause great harm to our World Heritage Area.

I am a bushwalker from the Blue Mountains who loves the outdoors. I strongly object to the proposed raising of the Warragamba Dam. It has now been clearly identified that the NSW Government has ridden roughshod over due process to get the result they want. In fact some of their actions arguably amount to corruption and should be investigated by ICAC. It is a disgrace.
I object to the project for the following reasons:
• There are many sensible alternatives to raising the dam wall, like building better and more flood evacuation roads, reducing the full supply level of the dam and simply reducing floodplain housing development.
• The Insurance Council of Australia has indicated the money would be better spent purchasing properties on the floodplains that should never have been built there.
• The effectiveness of the higher wall would be limited, and floods could still occur.
• Yet this government has a plan to house another 134,000 new residents on the Hawkesbury-Nepean floodplain over the next 30 years. Utterly ridiculous, this smacks of pandering to developers. Perhaps something else for ICAC to investigate.
• There is no modelling in the assessment of the economic benefits. Former NSW SES Deputy Commissioner and flood expert has stated the project is flawed and should not go ahead.
• Important areas of the Blue Mountains World Heritage Area, legislatively-protected habitat for many unique and endangered plants and animals such as the regent honeyeater, koalas and emus, as well as numerous indigenous sacred sites, would be inundated. This is a high cost for the vague possibility of making houses on the floodplains somewhat safer, particularly when other measures could be taken. Damage to natural and cultural values would be a clear breach of Australia’s obligations under the World Heritage Convention.
• The assessment undermines the legislation that is the foundation of environmental protection in NSW. This sets a dangerous precedent for Australia’s World Heritage and National Park protections.
• The wild Kowmung River would be inundated.
• Hardly any time was spent looking for koalas in the assessment and only one day assessing impacts to aquatic life including the platypus. One day was spent assessing Indigenous cultural heritage, barely a quarter of the impact area. This is not rigorous enough.
• Documents show the NSW government tried to avoid paying nearly $3 billion for environmental damage expected to occur as part of its plan to raise the dam wall. The NSW Environment Minister had stated in 2019 the bill for the environmental compensation would be so big, the project would not go ahead. The NSW Government has inappropriately artificially redefined the “impact area” (by using a 1 in 20 year flood rather than 1 in 100 years) to reduce its size by more than 50% to save on compensation. Disgraceful.
• The Environment Minister also said in 2019 that the economics of raising the dam wall would make the project unviable. It is a waste of taxpayers money.
• Water NSW fought with the independent ecologist originally writing the environmental assessment, pushing her to weaken her findings. That ecologist eventually quit and was replaced by someone who, until that very week, was working for Water NSW on the dam-raising project. This is appalling misconduct that should be investigated.
• Lack of rigorous evidence: Federal officials took issue with a draft environmental impact statement that claimed important ecosystems would not be negatively impacted — a claim they said had "no supporting evidence". Of course the ecosystems would be affected.
• These Commonwealth experts also criticised the NSW analysis for not including the effects of the 2019-2020 bushfires, which could have made plants and animals impacted by the dam project more vulnerable or more important. No post-bushfire fields surveys for threatened species have been undertaken.
• They also noted there was no evidence for an assertion that some habitat would not be "permanently" lost. It would most certainly be lost.
• Legal advisors in the NSW government recommended the removal of any claims which can't be scientifically verified. Such shortcomings should not be covered up and it is inappropriate for lawyers to suggest this.
• SMEC Engineering which undertook the environmental and cultural assessments has a very poor record working with indigenous people. It has been banned from working on World Bank projects overseas.

Dear Minister,
My name is Karen Tolson and I live in Mount Eliza, Victoria. From the age of ten I have been interested in birds when I joined the Gould League at school. I maintain a keen interest in the environment and the various bird species that dwell within. As a bird lover am very concerned about the Federal Govt's plan to raise the Warragamba Dam and I oppose this plan due to the potential impact on the surrounding environment and the detrimental effect it could have on the Critically Endangered Regent Honeyeater. All attempts must be made to conserve this bird's breeding sites, especially from flooding. The recent bushfires of 2019/20 have already had a devasting impact on the habitat. Please don't add to the problem.I urge you to support the Regent Honeyeater, its future existence depends on a stable and protected breeding habitat, free from potential destruction. State and Federal Goverment can be a force for strong, decisive action to protect unique and Critically Endangered species like the Regent Honeyeater who have no voice and therefore no real protection. Please reconsider this project and thus conserve the environment so these birds can continue to exist in our time and be known by future Australian generations!

See attached submission.
I do not wish to have my name or address published. I am lodging the submission on behalf of Wollondilly Resilience Network (WReN) Inc.

It is strange that there's no option for submissions from organisations other than government authorities. Lodging a submission on behalf of an organisation is not the same as making a personal submission.

I object to the proposal in the strongest terms.
There are four elements to my opposition:
1. Lack of strategic justification
2. Lack of project efficacy
3. Unacceptable impacts
4. Existence of alternative options

1. Lack of strategic justification (and lack of consultation)
There is a lack of strategic justification for this project. While the EIS is left to assess the residual impacts of the proposal, there has been no compelling case made for the project. The public is treated with contempt when government only consults on the residual impacts of the proposal via the EIS process. The hugely significant impacts of this proposal mean the strategic business case should scrutinised through a public exhibition process. We cannot trust the opaque processes of Cabinet to deal with such important decisions. We require transparency.

2. Raising dam wall will not effectively mitigate flood risk
Only 40% of the Hawkesbury-Nepean catchment lies upstream of Warragamba Dam. Further, future weather patterns will be very unpredictable meaning current thinking and modelling about flood mitigation might be shown to be inaccurate. For these reasons, we cannot be sure that the proposal will effectively mitigate against floods. To spend such a large amount of public money with no guarantee of efficacy is fiscally irresponsible.
Further, if the project provides a false sense and security and justification for an increase in development potential on the floodplains of the Hawkesbury-Nepean, then it will ultimately result in more people being in danger from flood events.

3. Unacceptable impacts
The impact of the proposal on natural systems and indigenous heritage is simply unacceptable. When the Blue Mountains gained World Heritage status, it represented a solemn commitment by all levels of government to protect the special qualities of the area. To disregard and put at risk our World Heritage status is unacceptable.
We cannot accept that such significant impacts must be suffered when there is no compelling case for the proposal.

4. EIS has not considered alternative options
Good governance and the Burra Charter dictates that alternative options must be exhaustively investigated before a deciding to proceed with this proposal. Alternative options include:

i) Buying back high risk property
One option to effectively reduce the risk to life and property from flooding is to buy out high risk properties, returning/converting them to agricultural or recreational uses, or natural reserves.
Locating significant agriculture, recreation and conservation areas close to Sydney would provide significant economic, social and environmental benefits for the region.
This option has not been fully investigated or costed. A comparison of this option against the costs and benefits of the dam raising proposal must be undertaken and made public.

ii) Utilising existing storage capacity and desalination plant
Another option to manage flood risk is to utilise existing storage capacity during flood events. Sydney currently has an underutilised desalination plant. Better use of this facility to provide for Sydney’s drinking water needs would enable the existing storage capacity at Warragamba to be left available for storage during flood events.
This option has not been fully investigated or costed. As it involves better use and management of existing infrastructure, with no new infrastructure required, it would be fiscally irresponsible not to investigate this potentially much cheaper option.

See attached document

I strongly object to the proposed raising of the Warragamba Dam wall. Please see my submission - attached.

Please see attached document

Raising the Warragamba dam wall will be ineffective, detrimental and dangerous.

Raising the Warragamba dam wall will be ineffective and the EIS does not properly address these following matters which are of great concern:

The extra volume of water held by Warragamba is miniscule compared to the total Hawkesbury Nepean Flood Volumes. See Karskens 'People of the River'. The largest recorded flood height in the 1860s was 100 foot at Penrith.
It has been exceedingly fortunate that over a relatively short, fairly flood free 200 year time frame against startling geomorphic evidence of major flooding, eg boulders jammed with horizontal strata standing vertically in caves in the Sydney Basin, is testament to the guesstimates of rainfall probabilities. With climate change we realise that extreme events will become even more extreme and have not been witnessed during our minuscule measurement period. See point below.
The entire volume of Glenbawn Dam in the Hunter flowed past Maitland in 20 minutes in the 1955 floods.
Antecedent water volumes in saturated catchments and already full additional Warragamba storage is a likely scenario for larger floods. Once full, how long will the extra storage water take to empty? – and what happens if there is a close following second flood? – as seems to be a common pattern…
Rainfall intensity is likely to increase by 11% for the area in the near future. See NSW government climate change projections and work by Yang and Bofu. Flash flooding with climate change will be more a concern.
The entire Hawkesbury Nepean catchment is far more developed than when it was completely forested. This changes flood hydrograph curves meaning higher flood peaks and faster velocities. What is the raising of the dam wall going to achieve?
Flooding in down stream tributaries eg McDonald, Colo and Grose will block the flow of water leaving the Nepean.
Storm powered sea surges will have a similar impact blocking the catchment
Each of these factors is important. The probabilities of them happening in unison make the protective element laughable.


Dangerous How strong is the dam wall when it is full and there is a massive landslip above the water storage during wet and totally full conditions? How does that compare with how strong the dam wall is now? What is the probability of large and nearby landslip? It is easy to see that the effect could be catastrophic.


Raising the wall will be detrimental.
The impact on plant biodiversity of prolonged inundation with silt laden waters is unknown but LIKELY to be dire. The precautionary principle should be applied – especially for upstream pristine rivers in a World Heritage area.

No study has been done on the cost of buying up land which should never have been built on the floodplain. How does that cost compare with the cost and ineffectiveness of raising the dam wall?

No study has been done on the short term processes which lead to poor planning approvals.
Overseas planning studies to ensure floodplain safety need to be undertaken. Flood plain areas should not be built on for urban development. Because they are prone to silt deposits, like the floodplains of the Nile, such lands are highly productive for agriculture. See Karskens 'People Of The River’. With projected 9bn people on the planet demanding food the raised dam wall should not be seen as a means of making fast money by alienating high quality agricultural land with residential developments.

The Aboriginal sacred sites within the proposed dam widening area should NOT be flooded. The ancient Aboriginal culture should be respected. The disrespect for Aboriginal sites is appalling.

Raising the dam wall will also result in flooding in the Blue Mountains World Heritage area and particularly affect wild rivers such as the Kowmung.

In short the NSW Govt needs to completely re-assess the scientific evidence in the affects raising the Warragamba dam wall will have, which they seem to have ignored. The NSW Government needs to be held accountable for their actions, particularly when scientific evidence is ignored.

I want the project to proceed. I want to alleviate the possibility of flooding in the Nepean Valley. While I believe that some residential developments in that valley should not have been approved given the known possibilities of such flooding, I think it is irresponsible to suggest those developments should now be undone and those who lose their homes be compensated instead of raising the dam. Financial compensation alone would not compensate those residents for the loss of their homes. But I would really like to see the Dam raising proposal modified now that Australia (and NSW) have committed to net zero emissions by 2050. There is a wonderful opportunity here to combine the dam raising with the production of hydroelectric power at the same time. I recognise that a hydroelectric dam that also alleviated flooding in the Nepean valley would require different design and be more expensive than a flood alleviation dam simpliciter, but I think we should take this opportunity and do that redesign as proof of our commitment to net zero by 2050.

To whom it may concern,
Raising the wall of Warragamba Dam is the wrong thing to do. Irreversible damage to the surrounding area and First Nation Pleaple's sacred sites will be destroyed, not to mention that habbitat of endangered and critically endangered species will be adversely affected. If for no other reasons, these should be enough to not go ahead.
There are many other reasons not to proceed, and these are being talked about by the very groups that have to support flood victums - the insurerers. They do not support the proposal. They think the money spent would be better used to buy back the most vunerable houses and turn the areas into parkland. They recognise that many areas that where approved for development years ago should not have been. New areas in flood zones should also not be approved. The insurers also recognise that the raising of the dam wall will only slightly delay the inevitable floods for a short while. Most of the flood waters do not come from the water behind the dam wall, so the idea that raising the dam wall will do a lot to stop flooding is a furphy.
Please scrap to project.

Dear Honourable Minister of Environment
I have been a resident of the Blue Mountains since 1976 and a homeowner of the Blue Mountains since 1999 and consider living here in this rare treasure a privilege and blessing. The environment of the Blue Mountains plays an important part of my everyday life. I have four children (between the ages of 9-18) who all love living in the Blue Mountains and exploring what it has to offer them. My children have grown up appreciating the National Park environment here and bushwalking, photography and mountain biking have become regular and important parts of our lives. Also, we will meet in the Blue Mountains National Park for family gatherings and celebrations. As a family we walk or mountain bike ride different tracks most weekends and consider this our extended backyard. Areas we regularly use in the Blue Mountains will be impacted by the raising of the Dam wall and this is of great concern to us.
To me, the proposed project and the negative impact on Blue Mountains National Park, and the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area is not just destroying a National Park, but I regard it as destroying part of my own homeland. My husband and I have lived in the Blue Mountains our whole lives, and we are strongly opposed to raising the dam wall.
I am horrified that parts of Blue Mountains National Park, and the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area and the Kowmung River, which is a declared Wild River, would be inundated by the project. In fact, the Government would be breaching its obligations under the World Heritage Convention. The Government is devaluing the status, worth and significance of a World Heritage National Park in NSW. Instead of protecting the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area this project would be sacrificing and desecrating the area and putting the World Heritage status in jeopardy. The Government will not be fulfilling its responsibilities to protect this area.
I am also concerned about what impact raising the dam would have on our indigenous people and culture. The Government would be showing a complete lack of respect and appreciation for the estimated, at least, 1500 Indigenous cultural heritage sites that would be inundated by a raised dam wall. Insufficient time has been given by the Government to properly assess the impact on Aboriginal Cultural Heritage. Only 27% of the impact area was assessed for First Nation cultural heritage. If the true impact of the dam is to be assessed, then the whole area needs to be assessed for the environmental impact and we need to ensure that our First Nations culture is preserved, respected and not destroyed.
Raising the dam wall would also have a negative impact on the critically endangered Regent Honeyeater, Koala colonies and Sydney’s last Emu population as their habitat will be flooded. This flooding would also impact aquatic life including the threatened Platypus, Mountain Galaxias, Australian Smelt and the Nepean River Herring. I am also concerned that the assessment that was carried was not thorough enough to accurately assess the environmental situation. Less than 4 hours was spent looking for koalas, only 7.5 metres of the 17 metres increase in dam height has been considered an ‘impact area.’ More time is needed to accurately assess the impact on our endangered wildlife. It would be extremely disappointing if our precious native animals and unique bush land are destroyed in the name of progress and making room for housing.
I understand that Chas Keys Former NSW SES Dep Commissioner and flood expert, held the opinion that the above project was flawed. Surely, his qualified opinion should be taken into account in the project’s assessment.
I strongly oppose the raising of the Warragamba Dam wall and I strongly urge you to urgently reconsider this project and look for the many viable alternatives for flood protection as well as other areas for residential development.
Our beautiful World Heritage bush land, First Nation culture and unique native animals need to be preserved and looked after not destroyed so the Government can make room for more houses in the floodplain areas. I know each one of my children and their 13 cousins who live in the Blue Mountains expect the bush to remain the same as they grow up within this unique and world heritage listed place they call home. There are many alternative options to raising the dam wall including building flood evacuation roads and reducing development in those areas.
So I would ask you to reconsider the plan to raise the dam wall and look at an alternative option instead.
During the past 2 years I have not made any political donations.
Lastly, I would like to reiterate that I strongly oppose the raising of the Warragamba dam wall.
Regards,

Dear Honourable Minister of Environment
I have been a resident of the Blue Mountains since 1976 and a homeowner of the Blue Mountains since 1999 and consider living here in this rare treasure a privilege and blessing. The environment of the Blue Mountains plays an important part of my everyday life. I have four children (between the ages of 9-18) who all love living in the Blue Mountains and exploring what it has to offer them. My children have grown up appreciating the National Park environment here and bushwalking, photography and mountain biking have become regular and important parts of our lives. Also, we will meet in the Blue Mountains National Park for family gatherings and celebrations. As a family we walk or mountain bike ride different tracks most weekends and consider this our extended backyard. Areas we regularly use in the Blue Mountains will be impacted by the raising of the Dam wall and this is of great concern to us.
To me, the proposed project and the negative impact on Blue Mountains National Park, and the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area is not just destroying a National Park, but I regard it as destroying part of my own homeland. My husband and I have lived in the Blue Mountains our whole lives, and we are strongly opposed to raising the dam wall.
I am horrified that parts of Blue Mountains National Park, and the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area and the Kowmung River, which is a declared Wild River, would be inundated by the project. In fact, the Government would be breaching its obligations under the World Heritage Convention. The Government is devaluing the status, worth and significance of a World Heritage National Park in NSW. Instead of protecting the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area this project would be sacrificing and desecrating the area and putting the World Heritage status in jeopardy. The Government will not be fulfilling its responsibilities to protect this area.
I am also concerned about what impact raising the dam would have on our indigenous people and culture. The Government would be showing a complete lack of respect and appreciation for the estimated, at least, 1500 Indigenous cultural heritage sites that would be inundated by a raised dam wall. Insufficient time has been given by the Government to properly assess the impact on Aboriginal Cultural Heritage. Only 27% of the impact area was assessed for First Nation cultural heritage. If the true impact of the dam is to be assessed, then the whole area needs to be assessed for the environmental impact and we need to ensure that our First Nations culture is preserved, respected and not destroyed.
Raising the dam wall would also have a negative impact on the critically endangered Regent Honeyeater, Koala colonies and Sydney’s last Emu population as their habitat will be flooded. This flooding would also impact aquatic life including the threatened Platypus, Mountain Galaxias, Australian Smelt and the Nepean River Herring. I am also concerned that the assessment that was carried was not thorough enough to accurately assess the environmental situation. Less than 4 hours was spent looking for koalas, only 7.5 metres of the 17 metres increase in dam height has been considered an ‘impact area.’ More time is needed to accurately assess the impact on our endangered wildlife. It would be extremely disappointing if our precious native animals and unique bush land are destroyed in the name of progress and making room for housing.
I understand that Chas Keys Former NSW SES Dep Commissioner and flood expert, held the opinion that the above project was flawed. Surely, his qualified opinion should be taken into account in the project’s assessment.
I strongly oppose the raising of the Warragamba Dam wall and I strongly urge you to urgently reconsider this project and look for the many viable alternatives for flood protection as well as other areas for residential development.
Our beautiful World Heritage bush land, First Nation culture and unique native animals need to be preserved and looked after not destroyed so the Government can make room for more houses in the floodplain areas. I know each one of my children and their 13 cousins who live in the Blue Mountains expect the bush to remain the same as they grow up within this unique and world heritage listed place they call home. There are many alternative options to raising the dam wall including building flood evacuation roads and reducing development in those areas.
So I would ask you to reconsider the plan to raise the dam wall and look at an alternative option instead.
During the past 2 years I have not made any political donations.
Lastly, I would like to reiterate that I strongly oppose the raising of the Warragamba dam wall.
Regards,

To whom it may concern, 05 November 2021
My name is Tom Gibian and I am a retired medical specialist living in outer north-west Sydney.
I am motivated to make a submission on this issue for several reasons, including the fact that my family owns a small house surrounded by bush at Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains. We naturally value highly the World Heritage status of the Blue Mountains National Park which will be put at risk by the proposed raising of the Warragamba Dam wall.
I oppose the proposed raising of the Warragamba Dam wall. I consider the current EIS to be quite inadequate on a number of grounds. The EIS does not adequately consider the effects of the catastrophic environmental damage from the recent unprecedented bushfires in the affected areas.
The EIS is grossly deficient in justifying the claimed benefits from raising the dam wall.
The EIS does not adequately consider alternative options to the dam wall raising.
The EIS therefore CANNOT be accepted as a basis for such a major environmentally-destructive proposal.

To whom it may concern,
I am writing this submission as a concerned Blue Mountains resident. It is alarming for me to hear that areas that are inhabited by endangered species will flood with the raising of the dam wall. Please do not allow the dam wall to be raised. Instead, please ensure that our government prevents devastion to the Kowmung River, threatened ecological communities, endangered species and cultural heritage sites in the Blue Mountains. Floodwaters also come from outside the catchment of the dam and raising the dam wall will not prevent flooding in the Hawkesbury-Nepean Valley downstream.

To whom it may concern,
I am a retired engineer living in the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. My first concern about the raising of the Warragamba Dam wall is as a resident of an internationally recognised heritage area. I am also concerned as an engineer, for the practical viability of raising the dam wall. I oppose this project.
SMEG Engineering, the firm that conducted the EIS for the project has shown a number of inadequacies in its studies for the EIS, as outlined in the following sections:
Assessment of the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area
• It is concerning and perplexing that SMEG has considered only 7.5 metres of the 17 metre increase in dam height as being the “impact area”. This is an arbitrary and contracted cut-off, especially considering that the area around the Warragamba Dam sits within an internationally listed heritage area, which is considered highly significant for both its Aboriginal cultural heritage values and its natural heritage values.
• It is hard to avoid the view that the reason for this cut-off, arbitrary for the purposes of cultural and natural heritage assessment, was an attempt to limit the area of study in order to reduce the environmental offset costs of the project.
• SMEG spent just 3.5 hours looking for the koala in its ill-conceived “impact area” and just one day was spent assessing the impact on aquatic species, including the Platypus. Both the koala and the Platypus are threatened species.
• Only 27% of the “impact area” was assessed for Aboriginal cultural heritage. And just one day was spent in the field by the author of the cultural heritage assessment.
Viability of the Raising of the Dam Wall
• The SMEG Engineering EIS outlined what were considered to be the flood management benefits of raising the dam wall. However it contained no modelling derived from those stated benefits. Again, this is perplexing. Perhaps SMEG Engineering failed to provide modelling because proper modelling would be so detrimental to the credibility of the project.
• This assertion of flood management benefits certainly needs further investigation before the project can proceed. Consider what happens at times of flood in the Hawkesbury River and Nepean River system. It forms what hydrologists call a “bathtub effect”, caused by a choke point that constricts the outflow of flood waters. These waters back up to form the “bathtub”. This “bathtub” is fed in large part by several tributaries beside and south of Warragamba Dam. These tributaries are independent of the Dam. Hence, the flooding of this river system is in large part caused by factors that cannot be mitigated by the raising of the dam wall.
• In times of severe flooding, such as in the March 2021 floods, the raised dam wall would provide far less mitigation benefit than claimed in SMEG’s EIS. The extra 17 metres of dam wall would increase the capacity of the dam by 1,000 billion litres. The March 2021 flood event was estimated to have dumped 1,500 billion litres. If the dam wall had been raised by 17 metres, there would still be 500 billion litres spilling to the flood plain. Then it would still have met up with the “bathtub”, coming in large part from sources other than the dam spill over. It has been estimated that the contribution from other sources to the flood waters in this flood was 50%. Chase Keys, a Former NSW SES Dep. Commissioner and flood expert has stated that the project is flawed and should not proceed.
• The SMEG assessment of the flood mitigation benefits of the project is severely inadequate. If flood mitigation is the concern of the NSW Government, it should confine its considerations to practicable options such as increasing the infrastructure for road evacuation and reducing flood plain development. Raising the dam wall will not solve the increasing flood problems that will be faced in a future of climate change. While a flood like the March 2021 Hawkesbury-Nepean system event has previously been considered to be in the 1/50 to 1/100 year category, we can be sure that this level of flooding will occur with far greater frequency in the future.
The people of NSW need a set of flood mitigation strategies that will provide resilience, not an irrational project that will fail to provide safety and stability; damage our internationally recognised cultural and natural heritage; and seriously compromise our international standing.

To whom it may concern,
I am totally opposed to the deleterious and ridiculous proposal to raise the wall of Warragamba Dam.

Raising the wall will NOT assist in flood mitigation as more than half the floodwater flows down the Nepean and Colo Rivers into the Hawkesbury.

Raising the wall is designed only to assist land developers to build on Hawkesbury floodplains. This could double the population of that region putting many lives at risk as current evacuation routes would not cope with the traffic.

Meanwhile, raising the dam wall would inundate thousands of hectares of valuable habitat, approximately 65 kilometres of wilderness river valleys.
it would flood sites of great significance to Aboriginal people.
it would flood habitat for vulnerable species like the regent honeyeater and the platypus along with many other species.
This flooding and damage could be visible from Echo Point, near Katoomba, having a negative impact on local eco-tourism.
Worse, such a project would threaten the World Heritage status of the Blue Mountains.
The raising of the Warragamba Dam wall is a dangerous, ill-advised proposal. The only ones to benefit would be land developers in the Hawkesbury and their cronies.
The project must be stopped and legislation must be passed to prevent any other attacks on the Blue Mountains World Heritage Listed area.

To whom it may concern,
I strongly oppose the raising of warragamba Dam, along with pretty much everyone except some members of the government.
First, I believe that the traditional owners, the Gundungurra people, have the right of consent, which they have not given.
Second, I believe that it is pointless and wasteful of tax payers' funds to fight against nature. At the moment there are only about 600 homes that need to be moved from the flood plain, and to do so would be a far cheaper and in the long term a more effective way of dealing with flooding. Flood plains perform vital functions within a water system and to attempt to stop those functions being performed is stupid and shortsighted. In any case nearly half of the flood waters will not be stopped by a higher dam wall in any case.
Third, a higher dam wall will irreversibly damage the Blue Mountains National Park and destroy habitats of endangered flora and fauna.

To whom it may concern,
I oppose raising the Warragamba Dam wall.
Raising the Warragamba Dam wall will flood Aboriginal heritage sites and World heritage wilderness. I have bushwalked in this area many times experiencing the amazing environment, the plant, the birds and animals. This will be a massive amount of destruction to things that are invaluable. You would think that for such destruction of such invaluable resources there would have been an extensive environmental evaluation of the area that had integrity and transparency but this is not the case.
The company doing the assessments are not considered worthy by the World bank, surely this must raise questions about the validity of their findings.
There has been no updated assessment of the environment after the devastating fires in 2019/20.
This area is habitat for many of our iconic animals and many of those are under threat from habitat loss. This area must be properly surveyed before any decisions can be made because the current EIS is not sufficient in detail and the integrity of the process and information is questionable.

To whom it may concern,
The proposal to raise the wall of Warragamba Dam by 10 metres concerns me. I would like to lodge an email expressing my view that the wall should not be raised.
As a long term bushwalker of almost 3 decades I have many times been able to enjoy the remote wilderness of Kanangra Boyd National Park. I do not want this to change. The area available to outdoor pursuits including bushwalking should not be diminished in any way.