The Great Artesian Basin (GAB) is a deep regional groundwater system that underlies twenty-two per cent of the Australian continent 4 and is around 1.7 million square kilometres in size. It is a very large and very old groundwater system, having been formed between 100 and 250 million years ago. As such, the age of Artesian Basin groundwater ranges from several thousand years near the recharge areas, to nearly two million years near Lake Eyre. 5 Groundwater is water found underground within free spaces amongst materials like sands, gravels, or sandstones. Where water occurs in such geology, the strata is known as an aquifer. 6

Mound Springs . . .

The Great Artesian Basin has natural outflows, or groundwater discharges, which emerge as springs. Over many millennia, the deposition and accumulation of calcium carbonate and other water-borne minerals by the movement of water creates rocky mounds with springs emerging from the top, often forming pools. 7 Other flowing springs are in the form of seeps in otherwise dry creekbeds. 8 These mound springs support unique water-dependent micro ecosystems, 9 which in turn support rare plants and aquatic fauna that are thought to be surviving remnants of an earlier time when the area was part of a larger tropical region. 10 Mound springs thus have great ecological, scientific, anthropological and potential 'economic' significance, 11 but are nevertheless being destroyed by nearby uranium mines and under threat by proposed nuclear waste dumps.

Custodians of the land . . .

For the Aboriginal communities in the area, the Great Artesian Basin is not an asset that can be couched in financial terms, but is rather a priceless cultural asset. The mound springs are of great cultural and spiritual significance to Aboriginal people, and are the principle sources of water in the arid and semi-arid inland of Australia. The Arabunna and Kokotha people are the traditional custodians of parts of the Lake Eyre region, in which mound springs affected by the withdrawal of water from the GAB are located. The Artesian waters and the springs they supply "form an integral part of the communal intellectual property of the Arabunna people." 12 Moreover, "any financial benefit that results in damage to the basin or springs would be at the destruction and desecration of Aborignal beliefs." 13

Since Europeans arrived . . .

Groundwater has been crucial in the 'development' of the pastoral, mining, and resource extraction industries of Central Australia. 14 Since the first bore was sunk near Burke in 1878, European activity has resulted in a steady decline in the flows from the mound springs. The Great Artesian Basin has been exploited by pastoralists, miners, rural towns and communities to the extent that the water pressure in heavily-developed areas has dropped tens of metres. 15 More recently, mining activities, especially in the sinking of bore fields for the Western Mining Corporation's (WMC) Olympic Dam copper and uranium mines, have exacerbated the drying of the mound springs. 16 Mineral extraction requires the manipulation of large quantities of water, 17 a practice that is drastically unbalancing the groundwater systems of the GAB to the extent that leads only to the conclusion that "[i]t is obvious that the continued misuse of the basin is not sustainable." 18

Studies on the sustainability of the water resources of the GAB have mostly been carried out by Olympic Dam Operations, and "[t]he few independent reports of data relevant to the question of sustainability of the resource are couched in complex jargon that is difficult to interpret and understand." 19 There is a clear need for independent studies to be carried out, and for people to educate themselves about a broad range of perspectives on the 'use' of the water in the GAB.

The 'finances' of water . . .

Today, some parts of the mining industry argue that groundwater can be rated by its economic value, which is measured by its quality in terms of salinity. Mining corporations hold that groundwater of seawater quality is 'useless' and has no economic value, and therefore should be afforded no environmental protection from their mining operations. This, however, is complicated by the fact that dozens of gold mines in Western Australia, for example, have used groundwater at salinites ranging from seawater quality to ten times higher for process plant water. 20