Primary : Water Supply - Where Does Our Water Come From?
Water Supply - Where Does Our Water Come From?
To learn more about saving water, please visit our Conserve Water site or contact your local retail water company.
Rainfall
When rain falls it is stored in Melbourne's protected catchments, most of which are closed to the public to ensure that no disease or litter gets into the water supply. You can see how much rain has been falling around Melbourne here.
Water Collection
Melbourne's protected catchments contain reservoirs where most of the city's water is stored. Our catchments are large areas of land outside of Melbourne where rainfall can be gathered in a protected environment. You can have a look at some fantastic pictures from our catchments here.
Storage Reservoirs
Once the rainwater is sitting in the catchments it is then stored at 9 major reservoirs around Melbourne. You can click on the following links (listed from largest to smallest) to learn more about each of the reservoirs.
- Thomson Reservoir
- Cardinia Reservoir
- Upper Yarra Reservoir
- Sugarloaf Reservoir
- Silvan Reservoir
- Yan Yean Reservoir
- Greenvale Reservoir
- Maroondah Reservoir
- O'Shannassy Reservoir
Government Retail Water Companies
Melbourne has three government retail water companies that provide water to your house. Approximately 480,000 million litres of fresh water is transported to homes and businesses each year by the retail water companies.
You can visit your local water retail water company by clicking on the following links:
- City West Water: provides drinking water and sewerage services to Melbourne's central business district and its inner and western suburbs.
- South East Water: provides drinking water and sewerage services to customers in the south-east of Melbourne.
- Yarra Valley Water: provides drinking water and sewerage services those living in the Yarra River catchment area of Melbourne (northern and eastern suburbs).
Sewage Treatment
What goes down your toilet travels via some very large pipes to one of Melbourne's two major treatment plants - the Eastern Treatment Plant in Bangholme or the Western Treatment Plant at Werribee.
You can follow the journey from your household toilet through the sewerage system via Melbourne Water's Sewer Tour.
Water Recycling
Some of the water that comes from our sewage treatment plants is carefully treated so that it is clean enough to use on local gardens and farming projects.
You can learn more about water recycling in Melbourne here.
Stormwater
Stormwater is the water that runs from our gutters when it rains, into our drains and rivers and creeks which carry it to Port Phillip Bay and Western Port.
You can learn more about stormwater here.
Melbourne's Rivers and Creeks
Rainwater is released from the city's reservoirs to maintain flows in Melbourne's rivers and creeks.
You can learn more about the Yarra River or dive into the Waterwatch program.
Bays and Oceans
Once the sewage has been carefully treated to make it as clean as possible, it is discharged into the ocean under a licence from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Victoria. We carefully monitor the quality of the water around the outfall.
Visit the EPA Victoria website.
Evaporation
Water evaporates to form rain clouds, leading to greater stores for Melbourne's protected catchments.
Learn more about our water storages.
Useful Teacher Resources
A list of useful teacher resources can be found under Educational Resources.