04/04/2024
Co-designing with the cultural values of water for First Nations peoples
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Groundwater is a critical resource for both the environment (e.g. groundwater dependent ecosystems) and for communities, with many rural and urban towns within Queensland either wholly or partly dependent on groundwater as the major source of town water. Groundwater-reliant towns in Queensland vary in population from large regional cities (e.g. Toowoomba) to small communities (e.g. Pormpuraaw).
As an underground resource, our knowledge of groundwater varies across the state with information essentially limited to data recorded from the installation of monitoring and production bores. This information gap has implications for the sustainable management of groundwater resources, with the rate of extraction potentially exceeding the rate of replenishment. This poses significant water security challenges for both the environment and groundwater dependent communities.
The Department of Natural Resource, Mines and Energy is undertaking a Regional Water Supply Security Assessment (RWSSA) program for communities across the state. This program delivers a shared understanding of the capability of a community’s water supply system to meet current and forecast future urban water demands, and the associated water supply security risks. Each RWSSA is underpinned by surface water and or groundwater hydrologic modelling and assessment efforts managed and undertaken by DES Queensland Hydrology Unit
The RWSSAs for groundwater dependent towns have been supported by the development of modelling tools to streamline the assessment of these towns considering the expected range of observable groundwater conditions. These tools embrace probabilistic assessment given uncertainties in our access to groundwater from unknown future weather and the disposition and properties of local aquifers from which water is extracted. The use of a model in partnership with specialist data assimilation and uncertainty quantification software aims to reduce uncertainties in water supply availability.
The Queensland Water Modelling Network (QWMN) is helping to improve the state’s capacity to model its groundwater resources and their quality. QWMN provides the tools, information and collaborative platforms to support best-practice use of water models, and the uptake of their results by policy makers and natural resource managers.
The QWMN has supported the DNRME RWSSA program through a project to test the application of the RWSSA modelling tools and software on real-world examples in order to assess and refine their functionality. Two real-world case studies, representing data poor and data rich situations, were identified, trialled and documented. The tools developed during the project were the topic of a technical workshop and are being used to support the RWSSA program. A final report will be posted on the QWMN website in the near future.
For more information contact us on [email protected].
