When he introduced the bill in August, Primary Industries Minister Niall Blair said dams were the lifeblood of regional communities, providing clean drinking water to towns and cities, sustaining productive irrigation and farming industries and provided recreational benefits.

“That’s why these reforms are so important, they ensure the ongoing maintenance and construction of our dams and this critical infrastructure can be managed safely and sustainably in to the future,” Blair said.

The proposed changes seek to retain important elements of the existing dam safety regime, to modernise the legislation and provide a best practice framework for the ongoing regulation of dam safety.

The passing of the Dams Safety Bill 2015 followed an independent review into dam safety and extensive community consultation. There are 378 dams in NSW prescribed under current legislation and the bill introduces a number of improvements to dam safety regulation.

The regulator will become a merit-based board comprising expertise in dam engineering, cost benefit analysis, public safety risk analysis and emergency management.

The bill will enable new dam safety standards to be developed that all prescribed dam owners will have to comply with. These standards will underpin the new regulatory framework, and be developed in consultation with key stakeholders.

Implementation of the reforms will replace the Dams Safety Act 1978 with new legislation.

It will remain business as usual for the Dams Safety Committee with implementation of the new act expected to take some time.

The Australian Greens, however, say the legislation will allow mining operations to compromise the safety of the state's water storages.

Greens NSW MP John Kaye said the bill would set up a new regulator, Dam Safety NSW.

He said a Planning Assessment Commission determination of a mining application would be required to only “take into account” the views of the new expert body.

“The new legislation is yet another gift to the Baird government’s friends in the mining industry,” Kaye said.

“The consent authority for a mining application can now choose to ignore advice from Dam Safety NSW, even if the expert body warns that a dam wall could collapse or the water could end up pouring into a mine shaft.

"We tried to amend the legislation to require the Minister for Water to take final responsibility for a mining approval near a dam.

“Instead, Minister Niall Blair tried to hide behind the bureaucrats, claiming that the Dam Safety NSW could issue a stop work order if it was concerned about the impacts of a proposed mine.”