Illawarra

• Completed projects

Sydney Water is working to reduce the frequency of overflows in the Illawarra during wet weather. These overflows can come from the wastewater system or spill on or inside private properties. This is part of Sydney Water’s $560 million SewerFix Program to improve the wastewater system and protect public health and the environment.

The work is being done by the SewerFix Wet Weather Alliance; a partnership between Sydney Water, Manidis Roberts, MWH, PB and United Group Infrastructure. It will ensure that wet weather overflows comply with frequency targets agreed with the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) formerly the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage. It will also address known overflow problems at private properties.

The work began early in 2011 and includes:

• building below-ground storage pipes to hold extra wastewater flows during wet weather
• building pipe diversions to divert wastewater flows into areas of the network with more capacity
• replacing existing wastewater pipes with larger pipes to increase capacity
• building additional emergency relief structures so that excess flows can be directed away from houses into nearby existing stormwater systems
• installing non return valves to stop wastewater flows being forced back into homes.