Southern Forests Irrigation Scheme (SFIS)

The Southern Forest Irrigation Scheme is an agricultural irrigation scheme being developed in the Manjimup-Pemberton area in south west Western Australia. The proposed scheme will comprise a 15 GL reservoir located on Record Brook and a pipeline distribution network that will supply water to irrigators who have purchased a water entitlement for the scheme.

In June 2019, a meeting was held with Jeremy Bower, SFIS project manager, to discuss the scheme and identify any potentially negative impacts on the Track and walkers.

The Foundation’s primary concerns were:

• Noise impacts along the Track (and at the Chappell’s Bridge recreation area) from any pumping system – and particularly at Boarding House Campsite which was estimated to be 3–400 metres from the pump house.
• Visual impacts of the pumping station and associated infrastructure.

As a result of the meeting, amendments have since been made to the pumping system to reduce possible noise and visual impacts. An underwater pump will be used so no pump house or weir needs to be built and there is minimal disturbance to the river bed. We were also advised that water will only be extracted when bigger flow events occur in the river. The Board is satisfied that the concerns of Bibbulmun Track users have been mitigated.

DBCA’s Recreation and Trails Unit will look at the final plans when available.

Download the SFIS fact sheet. NOTE: this was produced prior to the amendments to the scheme mentioned above. No weir will be constructed.

For more information visit the website.