Great Artesian Basin report

A new report reveals The Great Artesian Basin (GAB) in the Pilliga Forest of North West NSW is one of the most critical water recharge areas and is under siege from unconventional gas mining.

The report will be presented at today’s meeting of the NSW Great Artesian Basin Advisory Group in Mudgee.

Resource company Santos has put forward plans to the Federal Government to drill 850 coal seam gas wells into the area mapped as the highest water significance in NSW.

The report found that The GAB provides the only reliable source of fresh water throughout much of inland Australia and provides 22% of Australia’s freshwater supply and that if the proposed coal seam gas mining goes ahead we endanger this supply.

The GAB contains an extensive and complex groundwater system that extends over 22% of the Australian continent where it is the only reliable groundwater or surface water source. Water from the GAB is released under pressure to the surface through natural springs and artesian bores.

“Much of the groundwater held in the Great Artesian Basin is very old, having taken thousands to many hundreds of thousands of years to reach its current position in the basin from the recharge beds which are predominantly around the margins of the basin. Modern recharge is not thought to add significantly to the volume stored in the basin however it provides the crucial pressure head to keep the artesian waters flowing to the surface across this massive expanse of land.” 

The report found that gas exploration and production licenses in recharge zones appears to have progressed without much consideration of a GAB wide impact on artesian groundwater resources and pressures. It recommends a “basin wide approach” when considering activities such as coal seam gas operations.

The report suggests Australia look to how Germany manages potential impacts on groundwater. It says that the concept of “Wasserschutzgebiet” provides legislated groundwater protection zones to protect both water quality and quantity.

Read the report here. New

Great Artesian Basin coal-seam gas ‘risk’

It is one of the world’s largest underground water reservoirs, covering an area bigger than Iran. But a new report has found that the Great Artesian Basin’s pumping power comes from an area smaller than Tasmania.

A scientific review has raised questions about the basin’s cap­acity to withstand water extraction necessary for coal-seam gas mining.

Read the full story on The Australian.

Credit Suisse Equity Research – Santos Report

This important report by Credit Suisse economists discusses the gas price hike, particularly in relation to Santos’ admission that they developed the GLNG plant at Gladstone in part to drive up the price of gas in Australia and force a revaluation of their tenements.

The key sentence from the report from Credit Suisse says “Santos now argues that its aim in CLNG was always as much about raising the domestic gas price, and therefore re-rating large parts of the portfolio outside of GLNG, as it was about the project.” (page 4 bottom)

It goes on to say on page 5  “What is more, with a ~0.8%  drag  on  Australian  GDP  from  every $2/GJ rise in the domestic gas price, this view certainly wouldn’t have been terribly popular with politicians who approved the project.”

Click here to download the full report (1MB PDF).

The Frack Files

A series of articles from the New Internationalist magazine’s special fracking edition.

Why are communities around the world rising up against oil and gas extraction through the controversial process of fracking? We present the essential information and key issues, sorting the myths from the reality.

Click here to download the PDF document.

List of fracking bans worldwide

This document lists fracking bans across the world, including USA, UK, Europe, South Africa, South America, Australia, NZ and Canada.

Click here to download the full list.

This is the child of an “anarchist”!

Click here to download the poster.

Groundbreaking Report Calculates Damage Done by Fracking

As federal policy makers in the USA decide on rules for fracking on public lands, a new report calculates the toll of this dirty drilling on their environment, including 280 billion gallons of toxic wastewater generated by fracking in 2012—enough to flood all of Washington DC in a 22-foot deep toxic lagoon.

Read the full article here: http://ecowatch.com/2013/10/03/report-calculates-damage-by-fracking/

Harvard fracking study rings methane alarm bells in Australia

Australia’s coal seam gas industry has rejected a peer-reviewed report that suggests greenhouse gas emissions from drilling and fracking are 50 per cent worse than thought.

 

Bridge Out: Bombshell Study Finds Methane Emissions From Natural Gas Production Far Higher Than EPA Estimates

A major new study blows up the whole notion of natural gas as a short-term bridge fuel to a carbon-free economy.

Read the article here: http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/11/25/2988801/study-methane-emissions-natural-gas-production/

Symptomatology of a gas field

An independent health survey in the Tara rural residential estates and environs.

Click here to download the full report.