The Queensland Government yesterday approved coal seam gas mining in the Surat Basin that directly affects two huge Australian acquifers: Condamine and Great Artesian Basin.
[url=http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100923142503.htm ]Groundwater Depletion Rate Accelerating Worldwide[/url]
In recent decades the rate at which humans worldwide are pumping dry the vast underground stores of water that billions depend on has more than doubled say scientists who have conducted an unusual global assessment of groundwater use.
Groundwater represents about 30 percent of the available fresh water on the planet with surface water accounting for only one percent. The rest of the potable agriculture friendly supply is locked up in glaciers or the polar ice caps. This means that any reduction in the availability of groundwater
supplies could have profound effects for a growing human population.
The new assessment shows the highest rates of depletion in some of the world’s major agricultural centers including northwest India northeastern China northeast Pakistan California’s central valley and the midwestern United States.
“The rate of depletion increased almost linearly from the 1960s to the early 1990s” says Bierkens. “But then you see a sharp increase which is related to the increase of upcoming economies and population numbers; mainly in India and China.”
As groundwater is increasingly withdrawn the remaining water “will eventually be at a level so low that a regular farmer with his technology cannot reach it anymore” says Bierkens.
American Geophysical Union (2010 September 23). Groundwater depletion rate
accelerating worldwide. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 1