Sustainable management of coastal groundwater resources and opportunities for development - NSW
Project details
| Objective: |
To develop a sustainable management framework for coastal aquifers to enable stakeholders to actively participate in the management of groundwater resources, and to set benchmarks for the sustainable management of groundwater quantity and quality for coastal dune aquifers. |
| Funding: |
Total project funding of $1 692 000 with $966 000 from the Australian Government Water Fund and $726 000 from GHD Hassall, Kempsey Shire Council, New South Wales Office of Water, the Bureau of Rural Sciences and Ecoseal Developments. |
| Jurisdiction: |
NSW |
| Commenced: |
17 December 2007 |
| Completion: |
June 2011 |
Progress
About the project
The project will develop a sustainable management framework for coastal aquifers. It will enable stakeholders to actively participate in the management of groundwater resources and to set benchmarks for the sustainable management of groundwater quantity and quality for coastal dune aquifers. The management framework will be developed in the Macleay coastal aquifer system.
Project benefits
The project will:
- demonstrate an integrated approach for managing the availability and quality of coastal groundwater resources, as a strategy to prevent overallocation due to rapid urban and/or intensive agricultural development
- combine socio-economic and new state of the art groundwater and seawater intrusion modelling tools to support the long-term management of coastal sand aquifers
- develop a management framework that uses an extraction regime rather than volumetric extraction to manage water use
- advance current knowledge for integrating the quality and availability status of coastal groundwater systems, particularly where the risk of stressing coastal dune aquifers has increased due to greater demands from growing urban centres
- enhance sustainable development, shared use and risk-based management of these coastal dune aquifers and will also ensure that groundwater dependent ecosystems (such as native vegetation) in these coastal environments is protected and preserved for present and future generations.
An important aspect of the project is the involvement of the stakeholder groups Kempsey Shire Council, Northern Rivers Catchment Management Authority and the New South Wales Department of Natural Resources which will facilitate adoption pathways for the framework.