Australian Water Management Review Vol 2 2013 | Page 83

based projects that deliver research in support of current management and policy needs.” The NCGRT is addressing a major national skills shortage in groundwater expertise through industry training and links with international researchers. It is currently training over 120 PhD candidates, postdoctoral fellows and honours students. Using the latest technology and infrastructure, NCGRT researchers are pursuing world-leading science in several key areas: • characteristics of aquifers and aquitards • groundwater-dependent ecosystems and the potential impact of climate change • simulation of groundwater in complex subterranean systems • links between surface water and groundwater. The NCGRT also has legal and policy experts examining the highly complex but equally critical area of socio-economics, policy-making and management. Coal seam gas Among the many research priorities for Australia is the impact on groundwater from the mining boom in arid areas. This follows rapid growth in the development of new energy sources and technologies, including geothermal, carbon capture and storage, coal seam gas (CSG) and shale gas.

Community concerns about the water-related impacts of CSG and large coal mining has prompted the Australian Government to provide $150 million to establish an Independent Expert Scientific Committee. This committee provides expert scientific advice on new coal seam gas or coal mining proposals as requested by federal and state government regulators. The Committee also provides advice on research priorities and bioregional assessments. Research priorities will build on existing knowledge and improve the scientific understanding of the waterrelated impacts associated with these industries. Bioregional assessments will gather information about groundwater and its relationships with surface water, flora and fauna in priority regions. These assessments will improve the knowledge base, and strengthen the decision making process. A key focus will be Queensland where miners are working to release vast stores of methane gas locked up for millions of years in coal seams. In little over a decade, annual CSG production has jumped from 4 petajoules to around 235 petajoules. Energy companies drill wells several hundred metres to kilometres deep to release the gas, along with large quantities of underground water. This raises potential issues such as safe disposal and the risk of contamination of other water bodies with salt or chemicals.

The rate of extraction will continue to rise with the Queensland Government predicting 25,000 to 35,000 wells will be drilled by mining companies in future decades. Opponents claim groundwater extraction on such a scale has the potential to affect both surface and groundwater systems and lead to land subsidence and cross contamination between water bodies. A major area of controversy is a mining technique called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. This is used in some CSG wells and involves pumping water, sand and chemicals into the coal seams at high pressure. Fracking has sparked considerable controversy with farmers and environmental groups protesting over concerns about adjacent aquifers being contaminated. Miners argue the concerns are unfounded because of the depths of the wells. Studies into 70 years of hydraulic fracturing in the US supports this view. Murray–Darling Basin Another big challenge in Australian groundwater management is the Murray–Darling Basin, a region that covers one million square kilometres and supplies at least 40 per cent of the nation’s agricultural production. A sustainable yields project undertaken by the CSIRO in 2007–2008 found that groundwater use
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