{"id":934523,"date":"2026-10-20T04:20:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-20T04:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/934523\/"},"modified":"2026-10-20T04:20:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T04:20:11","slug":"eyre-peninsula-water-security-unchanged-despite-desal-plant-delays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/934523\/","title":{"rendered":"Eyre Peninsula water security ‘unchanged’ despite desal plant delays"},"content":{"rendered":"

Work on a desalination plant in regional South Australia has been delayed by six months, past when the region was due to run out of clean drinking water.<\/p>\n

SA Water has announced construction on the Eyre Peninsula Desalination Plant will be pushed back six months, to mid-2027, due to harder-than-usual granite affecting its underground boring<\/p>\n

Consumer access to water will be “unchanged”.<\/p>\n

Residents of Port Lincoln and its surrounding areas were told they could run out of clean drinking water<\/a> by 2026.<\/p>\n

The 35,000 residents of the Eyre Peninsula draw drinking water from the Uley South Basin, which has been depleting at a rate described as “dire” by the state government.<\/p>\n

The state government funded the then-$330 million Eyre Peninsula Desalination Plant project, which is now expected to cost approximately $470 million, at the Billy Lights Point coastal reserve.<\/p>\n

Early works began in February 2025 and it was projected to deliver fresh water by the end of this year.<\/p>\n

“We’re a bit behind where we’d like to be,” SA Water sustainable infrastructure general manager Peter Seltsikas said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Peter Seltsikas says tunnelling delays have pushed out the plant’s completion date. (ABC News: Brant Cumming)<\/p>\n

“The pipelines are done, the desalination plant is substantially complete.<\/p>\n

“But the tunnelling delay means the first water day is pushing out to the middle of next year.”<\/p>\n

Mr Seltsikas said higher-than-usual rains this year across the Eyre Peninsula had increased the water levels of the Uley South Basin.<\/p>\n

“We have enough water this year to continue to supply our customers and when the desalination plant comes next year they’ll continue to have secure water.”<\/p>\n

Cost blowouts and security concerns<\/p>\n

Glen Ingham was the spokesperson for community action group Hands Off Boston Bay, which was opposed to the location of the desalination plant.<\/p>\n

He said the delays were testing the government’s claims the site is the “cheapest and quickest” option.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Glen Ingham was the spokesperson for Hands Off Boston Bay. (ABC Eyre Peninsula: Jodie Hamilton)<\/p>\n

“Here we are now at the end of 2026 and they’re [pushing the end date] to the middle of next year.<\/p>\n

“I’m certain it will be beyond that and the cost blowout will be huge,” he said.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the state government said the revised budget of the project would be detailed once “contractual processes with delivery partners are complete”.<\/p>\n

Mr Seltsikas said the authority recognised the ongoing need to reduce water being taken from the basin.<\/p>\n

“So we are very much concerned about water security,” he said.<\/p>\n

The state government said a revised Water Allocation Plan for the Southern Basins<\/a> meant SA Water could extract water from the Uley South Basin and River Murray to meet consumer demand.<\/p>\n

SA Water’s groundwater allocation will reduce to 3.5 gigalitres per year in 2027-28, as the plant comes online.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson said “it is not expected that water restrictions will be needed”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Work on a desalination plant in regional South Australia has been delayed by six months, past when the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":934524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,501114,32845,501118,75,13748,501113,501123,501121,501122,501116,501115,501117,242115,501120,128,501119],"class_list":["post-934523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-billy-lights-point-development","tag-desalination-plant","tag-desalination-plant-sa","tag-environment","tag-eyre-peninsula","tag-eyre-peninsula-desalination-plant","tag-glen-ingham","tag-hands-off-boston-bay","tag-peter-seltsikas","tag-port-lincoln-runn-out-of-water","tag-port-lincoln-water","tag-port-lincolns-water-supply","tag-sa-water","tag-sa-water-desalination-plant","tag-science","tag-where-in-sa-will-run-out-of-water"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=934523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/934524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=934523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=934523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=934523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}