West Camden Water Recycling Plant upgrade

Delivering quality wastewater services

Our West Camden Water Recycling Plant is operating at full capacity and needs an upgrade to support growth in the catchment and maintain environmental protection standards.


About this project

We're planning for Sydney's future by providing wastewater services that support city growth while protecting public health and the environment.

Our West Camden Water Recycling Plant is operating at full capacity and needs an upgrade to support growth in the catchment and maintain environmental protection standards.

The upgrade will double the plant's treatment capacity to serve 176,000 people and accommodate future growth in the catchment until 2046. In the short term, the plant will handle temporary flows from the South West Growth Area until the Upper South Creek Advanced Water Recycling Centre is in operation in 2026.

The upgrade involves:

  • building new assets
  • decommissioning and repurposing existing assets
  • implementing new technology
  • building a new membrane bioreactor to effectively filter contaminants from wastewater.

Benefits

The West Camden Water Recycling Plant upgrade supports growth, housing and the environment, helping us achieve our vision of providing world-class water services for a better life.

We're introducing new technology to treat wastewater to a high standard. This means that treatment discharges into waterways will have a very high quality, which will improve waterway health.

This new technology takes up less space, allowing us to increase our emergency storage capacity. This will help reduce the risk of overflows and improve environmental outcomes during wet weather.

Impacts

Most of the construction is within our existing site to minimise impact to the community. The plant will remain fully operational during the upgrade.


Project timeline

December 2018: Preferred option approval
December 2020: Detailed design start
October 2021: Construction start
September 2024: Commissioning of new plant starts
Mid 2025: Construction completion


Project updates

29 May 2025
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer I BMD will be completing painting work on the Influent Balance Tanks on Sunday 1 June 2025.

Read more
09 May 2025
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer I BMD will be investigating and disassembling the Chlorine Contact Tank. 

Read more
02 April 2025
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer BMD has finished decommissioning the old MLE tank. This tank will now be repurposed into a balance tank, requiring fitout, testing and commissioning.

Read more
28 March 2025
Continued extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will continue working extended hours to carry out supervision of the newly connected equipment.

Read more
06 March 2025
Upcoming extended work hours during March 2025

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to finish work on the new inlet.

Read more
07 February 2025
Decommissioning work

Our delivery partner Downer BMD has started commissioning the new facilities. This involves inspecting and testing. Over the coming months, we will be taking the old process units offline for cleaning to finalise this process.

Read more
03 February 2025
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out supervision of the newly connected inlet works to the MBR.

Read more
18 December 2024
Christmas shutdown

While most of our construction team will be taking a well-earned break over the Christmas and New Year period, we will be required to maintain commissioning supervision during this time.

Read more
03 December 2024
Upcoming extended work hours – early starts

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours with early starts during the hotter months to maintain the work program.

Read more
22 November 2024
Upcoming extended work hours – 5 December 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out testing of new lighting.

Read more
04 November 2024
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out testing of the switchroom.

Read more
14 October 2024
Upcoming extended work hours to February 2025

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be continue working extended work hours to carry out commissioning and testing inspections of the new plant.

Read more
10 September 2024
Upcoming extended work hours – 13 September 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out inspections of the Chlorine Contact Tank.

Read more
03 September 2024
Upcoming extended work hours – September 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to deliver critical concrete pours.

Read more
27 August 2024
Upcoming extended work hours – August to September 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out electrical cable pulling, terminations and testing of the new plant.

Read more
15 July 2024
Upcoming extended hours work – July to August 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours.

Read more
06 June 2024
Upcoming extended work hours to October 2024

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to carry out commissioning and testing inspections of the new plant.

Read more
16 April 2024
Biodiversity restoration update with Camden Council

It's been 9 months since the West Camden Water Recycling Plant Upgrade project team and the local community planted over 3,000 native trees at Elizabeth Macarthur Reserve as part of our biodiversity offset.

Read more
11 April 2024
Upcoming extended work hours

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working extended work hours to deliver critical concrete pours.

Read more
20 February 2024
Upcoming night work

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be working overnight to demobilise the 100 tonne crane from site. We are required to transport oversize and overmass vehicle at night to comply with TfNSW regulations.

Read more
11 December 2023
Christmas shutdown

Our construction team will be taking a well earned break over the Christmas and New Year period with no works being carried out from Friday 22 December 2023 until Tuesday 2 January 2024. 

Read more
01 December 2023
Update to extended work hours

Downer BMD will be working extended hours until April 2024.

Read more
29 August 2023
Digester lid lifted into place

On Wednesday 23 August things were flying high at the West Camden Water Recycling Plant, namely the fixed lid that sits atop the plant's newest digester.

Read more
09 August 2023
Biodiversity restoration brings out the community

Established in 1996, National Tree Day has grown into Australia's largest community tree-planting and nature care event. The program is a call to action for all Australians to get their hands dirty and give back to their community.

Read more
27 March 2023
Upcoming night works

We will be working overnight to allow our delivery partner Downer BMD to start building the Blower Switch Room at the WRP.

Read more
24 March 2023
Celebrating Harmony Day

This week we celebrated Harmony Day at West Camden WRP with our team from Downer|BMD. Harmony Day is a time for everyone to celebrate the enormous benefits of multiculturalism.

Read more
23 February 2023
Home among the gumtrees

The 'loss of hollow-bearing trees' is a key threat listed under the Biodiversity Conservation Act 2016, with approximately 20% of native fauna species relying on tree hollows for roosting, nesting and breeding.

Read more
01 December 2022
Christmas shutdown

Our construction team will be taking a well earned break over the Christmas and New Year period, with no works being carried out from Friday 23 December 2022 until Tuesday 3 January 2023.

Read more
28 November 2022
Changes to our work hours

We're upgrading the West Camden Water Recycling Plant (WRP) to increase its treatment capacity.

Read more
03 November 2022
Western Sydney Uni Site Tour

Together with our contractor Downer BMD, Sydney Water provided a tour of the West Camden Water Recycling Plant (WRP) to the Engineering undergraduate students from Western Sydney University.

Read more
27 September 2022
Rescheduled night work

Due to the heavy rain, we could not divert the pipes last week.

Read more
08 August 2022
Update: MBR concrete pour dates

We will temporarily extend our work hours to allow our delivery partner Downer BMD to complete these concrete works for membrane bioreactors (MBR).

Read more
15 July 2022
Concrete works for membrane bioreactors

Our delivery partner Downer BMD will be starting the task of concreting the membrane bioreactors (MBR). This will occur between 29 July and 31 October.

Read more
29 June 2022
Update to weekday work hours

We will temporarily extend our work hours to allow our delivery partner Downer BMD to import required material during low traffic movement periods.

Read more
23 June 2022
World Environment Day at West Camden WRP

To commemorate Environment Week at Sydney Water, the West Camden WRP team joined forces with our project delivery partner Downer BMD to establish an area of Cumberland Plain Woodland (CPW) to supplement the surrounding communities.

Read more
13 April 2022
Update to weekend work hours

With the recent rain events, our delivery partner Downer BMD will continue to work extended Saturday hours to meet critical milestones.

Read more
08 April 2022
Traditional smoking ceremony marks start of construction for the West Camden WRP upgrade works

Sydney Water and our project delivery partner Downer BMD came together this week to participate in a traditional smoking ceremony to help mark the start of construction for the West Camden Water Recycling Plant (WRP) Upgrade works.

Read more
22 March 2022
High voltage power works

Our delivery partner Downer BMD has started work to install new underground electrical cables for the provision of alternative power supply to the WRP from the electrical substation south of Burragorang Road.

Read more
02 March 2022
Project update: sludge lagoon and earth works

We have made some good progress lately on upgrades to the WRP site with the plant being in full operation!

Read more
25 February 2022
Changes to weekend work hours

Due to the recent COVID 19 restrictions and rain events, we need to extend our Saturday working hours to meet critical project milestones and ensure the plant will meet its increasing load.

Read more
11 February 2022
Upcoming weekend work

As part of the decommissioning of the sludge lagoon, our contractor Downer/BMD will need to work on the weekend of 12 and 13 February 2022. The work will be done between 7am and 5pm.

Read more
20 December 2021
What to expect during the upgrade of the plant

During the upgrade of the West Camden Water Recycling Plant there will be a few disruptions. We will try to keep these to a minimum. However, some are unavoidable.

Read more
23 November 2021
Commencement of sludge lagoon decommissioning

We are now upgrading the West Camden Water Recycling Plant to accommodate the additional wastewater for our growing community. Our partner Downer BMD has started decommissioning the sludge lagoon in late November.

Read more
13 October 2021
Construction start date is set

We are all set to get started with the upgrade works of the West Camden WRP!

Read more
29 September 2021
Sydney Water awards construction contract

We are excited to announce that we have partnered with Downer and BMD Group to deliver the West Camden Water Recycling Plant (WRP) Amplification project. 

Read more



FAQs 

Currently the West Camden Recycling Plant wastewater treatment capacity is 16 ML/d. That's the equivalent of 88,000 people.

Once upgraded, the plant's capacity will double to 32 ML/d capacity to serve 176,000 people to service forecast growth in the West Camden catchment to 2046. 

Construction will begin in October 2021 and will be completed by early 2025.

The upgrade involves:

  • building of new assets  
  • decommission and repurposing of existing assets
  • implementing new technology.

The new technology is smaller, so requires less space on the site and also has a smaller carbon construction footprint. This provides us with more space which we can use for emergency storage on-site. Emergency storage is particularly important during wet weather events to prevent any overflows.

One of the new assets we will be constructing on the site as part of the plant upgrade is a membrane bioreactor, or MBR.

The advanced advantage is that it's not just providing the biological treatment, which is the conventional approach, but it's also providing a very high level of filtration to remove practically all of the contaminants from the wastewater.

The result is a better quality of recycled water and the water we discharge in our waterways.

We will be implementing new technology, which will allow us to treat the wastewater to a very high standard. This means that any treatment discharges to the waterways will have a very high quality and will improve waterway health.

The new technology will also require less space on site. We will use this space to increase our emergency storage capacity, which will improve environmental outcomes during wet weather events as it reduces the risk of overflows.

No. The plant will be in full operation while we are working on the upgrade.