Marian Water Named As A Top Drop

In the ultimate of grudge matches, there’s nothing that tastes sweeter than a Queensland victory against New South Wales. Unless you’re talking about the clean, crisp taste of Marian’s water, which again was recognized as being amongst the best tasting water in Australia.

Water from Mackay Regional Council's Marian Water Treatment Plant was named a top drop at the 2022 Ixom Water of Origin Competition.

Mackay Regional Council, representing Queensland, went head-to-head with Shoalhaven City Council, representing New South Wales, in a best tasting tap water competition. Queensland were victorious, making it 6-2 to Queensland in the eight years the competition has been running.

Water operators Brad Richards and Mark Vairy were at the conference on the Gold Coast to collect the trophy, with Mr Vairy complementing the water treatment team, saying it takes constant monitoring.

“We have a good source of water at the Marian plant, which comes from the rainforest and is surrounded by little industry,” Mr Vairy said.

“We have a great team of operators, from electrical and mechanical to the operators, who proactively look after the plant. It takes constant fine tuning and passionate trialing to get the best tasting water and the team is constantly learning, trying to improve our processes.”

Mackay was well represented at the awards, with Mr Richards and Mr Vairy also coming in third for best operator paper. Young operator Matthew Gosper was highly commended in the young operator of the year and Kevin Kippenberger was a finalist for operator of the year.

There are two main water treatment plants in the Mackay Region, at Mackay and Marian, as well as four smaller plants which disinfect or soften the water depending on its needs at Gargett, Finch Hatton, Eton and Bloomsbury. Because the chemistry at each water source is different, it requires different solutions to produce good tasting drinking water.

“The Eton plant softens the water as well as disinfects it, whereas the one at Bloomsbury removes heavy metals,” Mr Vairy said.

The Marian Water Treatment Plant has online instrumentation which monitors the water 24/7. There are on-call operators to respond if the instrumentation picks up an anomaly in the water.

The Ixom Water of Origin, held annually at the WIOA Australia Conference, raises awareness of the high quality of drinking water in both Queensland and New South Wales, and also recognises the outstanding efforts of our water industry workers.

Mackay Regional Council Water operators Brad Richards (centre) and Mark Vairy collect the Water of Origin trophy at the 2022 Ixom Water of Origin Competition

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