{"id":17097,"date":"2014-04-11T06:14:41","date_gmt":"2014-04-10T20:14:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nofibs.com.au\/?p=17097"},"modified":"2019-04-13T23:58:08","modified_gmt":"2019-04-13T13:58:08","slug":"water-under-fire-jeanroxon-reports-pilliga-contamination-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/water-under-fire-jeanroxon-reports-pilliga-contamination-concerns\/","title":{"rendered":"Water under fire: @JeanRoxon reports #Pilliga contamination concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"[clear]\n
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A group of farmers and councillors met last week in north-west NSW to take a stand against a Coal Seam Gas (CSG) development proposed in the area. Narrabri Shire councillor Bevan O\u2019Reagan said: \u201cWe haven\u2019t got a plan B if the water is damaged.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australian gas and oil producer Santos last week submitted its Preliminary Environmental Assessment for a CSG mine in the Narrabri region. This submission follows the successful application by coal company Whitehaven, to increase open-cut mining in the nearby Leard State Forest.<\/p>\n

The northern plains region is known for its abundance of coal and gas and lies on the eastern edge of the Great Artesian Basin. The contamination of this aquifer by salt and heavy metals, such as mercury, would have a devastating impact on local agriculture and native flora and fauna.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom our grazing point of view it [bore water] is 100 per cent of our water,” local farmer Rob Vickery said, “if the water\u2019s damaged then the land\u2019s damaged.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the greatest concerns expressed at last week’s meeting was that excess water produced by CSG mining contained high amounts of saline and some poisons and heavy metals and these would contaminate the bore water.\u00a0Both Santos and Whitehaven have released impact assessments outlining their intended management of water.<\/p>\n

In a public booklet Santos said: \u201cThe water we extract during our operations is saline.The water does not contain significant levels of other chemicals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Famers were also concerned that through their mining Santos would lower the groundwater level by up to 20 metres.<\/p>\n

However, Santos stated that through their “Managed Aquifer Recharge” they will be able to inject treated water from mining back into the aquifer system, thus \u201cmitigate[ing] potential impacts arising from GSG well groundwater abstraction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dayne Pratzky, an environmental activist and farmer from Chinchilla in Queensland was doubtful. He said: \u201c[they] can’t take the water away and have no consequences”. Mr Pratzky also said that similar issues arose with CSG mining near his property in Queensland and that \u201cthey are talking salt piles 11 kilometres long, 40 metres wide and 30 metres high.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whitehaven\u2019s proposed open-cut mine at Maules Creek a similar concern about water treatment has been raised. The new mine, to be developed in the centre of the Leard State Forest, has received comment over the conservation and treatment of threatened and endangered flora and fauna.<\/p>\n

Whitehaven\u2019s ecological impact assessment stated that: \u201cNo groundwater dependent ecosystems have been identified within the project boundary,” however, environmental activist from the Leard Blockade, Murray Dreschler, is still worried.<\/p>\n

He claims that Whitehaven have stated \u201cthat they will drop the water table by ten to fifteen metres for a thousand years.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest concern is water,\u201d Mr Dreschler said, \u201cwithout water everything dies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Santos and Whitehaven were contacted for comment and both companies declined.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[clear]   A group of farmers and councillors met last week in north-west NSW to take a stand against a Coal Seam Gas (CSG) development proposed in the area. Narrabri Shire councillor Bevan O\u2019Reagan said: \u201cWe haven\u2019t got a plan B if the water is damaged.\u201d Australian gas and oil producer Santos last week submitted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":17099,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3434,1584,1739,514,1469,585],"tags":[1484,1485,1486],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/PILLIGA-PROTEST.jpg?fit=799%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3t0mw-4rL","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17097"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}