Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon
A boil water notice has been issued for two Clutha water schemes where some residents have been without reliable tap water for days.
Earlier this week, a conserve water notice was issued for the Richardson South water scheme consumers and Kaka Point residents.
A Kaka Point resident who does not have a back up water tank said he had not been able to flush his toilet or shower since Monday.
Clutha District Mayor Bryan Cadogan said the treatment plant had not been operating properly since Saturday and contractors had been unable to resolve the issue.
A boil water notice is now in place and water is bypassing the treatment plant so there is enough for stock, bathing and other purposes.
"Council sympathises with the residents enduring limited supply, and once again stresses the importance of having individual storage to mitigate against the inevitable limitations that come with communities being supplied from a rural water scheme," Cadogan said.
"The pragmatic approach that has served many of our communities well for generations does require residents to understand the decisions considered prudent by their forebears, where they balanced the efficiencies and savings of taking supply from the local rural water scheme and in doing so realised the need to provide their own storage tanks and that like all consumers on these schemes, the allocation of water would be controlled by restrictors."
A water tanker is located at Kaka Point Fire Station.
The council has approved scoping funding to improve the plant and increase capacity in the medium term.
"Council will continue to work closely with our operations contractor to ensure the plant works correctly and we encourage all users to ensure they have adequate storage to avoid running out of water."
They are both restricted water schemes supplied by the Puerua Water Treatment Plant which drip feed a set amount of water to each connection over a 24 hour period.
"Customers on restricted schemes are required to have a minimum of two days storage and for Kaka Point this is a storage tank of at least 4000 litres.
"If someone is on a restricted supply and doesn't have a storage tank then they could expect frequent outages as the scheme is not designed to operate without an on-site storage tank."
