A framework to provide for the assessment of environmental water requirements of groundwater dependent ecosystems

This project carried over from the National Rivers Consortium Program and developed management tools to help incorporate groundwater dependant ecosystem (GDE) water requirements into water allocation planning by establishing a uniform and consistent approach to the assessment of environmental water requirements.

The project involved three key components:-

1. Development of a GDE Assessment Toolbox - tools to help determine whether an ecosystem depends on groundwater and what the nature of the dependence might be
2. Development of Operational Methodologies - ways for information gathered by the different tools in the Toolbox to be used to develop environmental water requirements for different ecosystem types
3. Field investigations and trials - procedures for assessing and testing tools and methods

This project was completed by REM, SKM and CSIRO. It was completed April 2007.

Outcomes

1. Provide an update on the "desktop" approach to help identify potential groundwater dependent ecosystems at the catchment scale
2. Review the more advanced techniques available to determine groundwater dependency and the current water regime for different types of groundwater dependent ecosystems
3. Provide a framework to assess the natural water regime when it is suspected that it will be different from the current water regime
4. Development of a risk assessment framework to develop robust and defensible Environmental Water Requirements (EWRs)
5. Provide recommendations to help managers to develop water allocation plans that a) have the proper built-in mechanisms to ensure that water provisions for the environment are met, and b) are flexible enough to allow regular updating over time

Publications and Resources

None listed

Citation

Land & Water Australia. 2009. A framework to provide for the assessment of environmental water requirements of groundwater dependent ecosystems. [Online] (Updated July 30th, 2009)
Available at: http://lwa.gov.au/node/3225 [Accessed Sunday 21st of March 2010 08:19:14 AM ].