Linton Water Notices

Your water will now come from the two big green reservoirs you can see from Camp Road. The reservoirs each with a capacity of 1.8 million litres, are filled with treated drinking water from Palmerston North City Council’s network.

Our new on-camp treatment plant keeps chlorine levels in the reservoirs within the range required by drinking water regulations, and a new pump station distributes the water to your taps.

We will be swapping back and forth between the new and old supplies for a couple of weeks while we test the system and iron out any technical issues. From Monday 24 August we expect to be running 100% from the new supply.

During the commissioning process over the next couple of weeks, you may notice occasional pressure fluctuations, slight changes in taste, or possibly cloudiness or discoloration. Please be assured these issues don’t mean the water is unsafe to drink. We are monitoring the water quality very closely.

• If your water does appear cloudy, it is likely due to fine air bubbles. Try letting it sit for a few minutes, and it should clear.
• If you notice discolouration or dirtiness in your water, this could be due to sediment in pipes being disturbed by pressure fluctuations. Try running your taps for a few minutes and it should clear.
• If these steps don’t resolve the issues, you can call our facilities maintenance contractor, Citycare, on 0800 801 252. They will investigate and may flush larger volumes of water from the hydrants in the street.

Since Linton Military Camp was established, we’ve produced our own drinking water from a system of onsite groundwater bores. That system served us well, but while the water was sourced from deep aquifers and was safe to drink, our ageing treatment plant was unable to meet the increasingly stringent water treatment rules and regulations. Our bores are also struggling to keep up with demand.

This new supply from Palmerston North achieves full compliance with the regulations and increases resilience through the large volume of stored water. The old treatment plant, concrete reservoir, water tower and most of the bores will be decommissioned, but we will keep one bore in reserve as an emergency source in case anything happens with the connection to Palmerston North.

If you want to learn more about the water supply at Linton, please visit www.nzdf.mil.nz/water, or email water@nzdf.mil.nz