Victoria’s largest regional water authority, Barwon Water, provides water and sewerage services to the greater Geelong area, and nearby coastal and rural communities.  

Barwon Water’s Armstrong Creek recycled water network produces Class A recycled water for distribution to residents, businesses, parks and community facilities through a ‘purple pipe’ network. However, recent growth projections raised concerns about the capacity of the network to meet future demands for recycled water.

Urban Water Solutions was engaged to produce network model simulations of existing and future demand scenarios extending to 2036 growth forecasts. The simulations examined if the supply into the recycled water network would need to be topped up from the potable network when subjected to Peak Day demand.

Additional scenarios were performed to examine the capacity of the potable network to deliver the recycled water demand in the event of a planned or unplanned shutdown of the recycled water system.

The results from this analysis provided Barwon Water with an enhanced understanding of the strengths and shortcomings of the Armstrong Creek Class A recycled network. This has allowed Barwon Water to plan the upgrades necessary to manage future Peak Day demands and emergency shut down situations.