Researchers have used new water-tracing technology in the Sydney Basin for the first time to determine how groundwater moves in the different layers of rock below the surface.
The study, conducted by the University of New South Wales (UNSW) Australia, provides a baseline against which any future impacts on groundwater from mining operations, groundwater abstraction or climate change can be assessed. “All underground engineering projects have the potential to have an impact on groundwater,” says study author and PhD candidate Katarina David, from the UNSW Connected Waters Initiative (CWI). “So it is essential we understand how the water falling on the surface finds its way to the aquifers deep underground.” Study author, Dr Wendy Timms, also from CWI, says: “Our research has global relevance as well, because this new technology provides a quick and cheap alternative to having to install numerous boreholes for groundwater monitoring.” The study is published in the journal Science of the Total Environment. The team used a 300-metre deep core drilled through the layers of sandstone and claystone at a site on the Illawarra plateau. Small sections of the moist rock from the core were then carefully preserved and analysed in the UNSW laboratory.
