CANBERRA'S urban water corporation has joined the throng of government agencies trying to outbid each other for irrigators' water.
Australian Capital Territory's Energy and Water Corporation is making a bid for 5000 megalitres to secure the national capital's water reserves.
ACTEW's purchase is part of a plan that may eventually lead to the purchase of 20,000 to 25,000 megalitres of high security entitlement from NSW, Victorian and South Australian irrigators.
However, at this stage ACTEW Water Security major projects acting director Chris Webb said the corporation was simply testing the market to see what volumes were available.
ACTEW has commissioned the Acqua Fiducia consultancy to advise it on the purchase of the 5000 megalitres, which is a joint-venture between Sydney firm BBB Capital and businessman Brian Price.
Mr Price is the second largest shareholder in the National Stock Exchange, which owns Australia's largest corporate water trading company - The Waterexchange.
Mr Webb said Acqua Fiducia had identified some parcels of water.
"And we will look at purchasing some if it seems to be OK," he said. "From our point of view we're looking at a range of options and this seems like an opportunity where we can supplement our supplies."
Mr Webb said any decision to purchase more water would depend on climatic conditions and ACT Government approval.
The original strategy was to store water purchased from irrigators in the Snowy Hydro Corporation's Tantangara Dam, which would then be piped to Canberra's Cotter Dam.
However, Mr Webb said the Cotter Dam had been enlarged from 4000 to 78,000 megalitres to capture more of the Cotter River's flows, which in turn has delayed the need to buy and pipe water from Tantangara to the Cotter Dam.
