Updated
An expert sandstone geomorphologist is warning that any future expansion of underground coal mining will deliver "serious long-term and irreparable damage" to Sydney’s water catchments.
Illawarra Coal, a subsidiary of BHP Billiton, operates a longwall coal mine under the streams and upland swamps that drain into Lake Cordeaux, which in turn feeds Sydney’s Prospect Reservoir.
Dr Ann Young, an expert member of a community planning panel who has monitored the mining area for five years, explained the extent of the problem.
"It's not just the swamps that are draining, but the whole of the catchment in which the swamps lie," she said.
The Upper Nepean Special Area is an 89,000-hectare pristine wilderness zone, protected since the 1930's and home to a rich array of threatened species and endangered ecological communities.
Members of the public are forbidden to enter the area, under threat of a $44,000 fine.
The clean drinking water from the catchment supplies around 4.5 million people.
Dr Young says that in her view, extensive cracking to stream-beds and recent piezometer data released by Illawarra Coal, demonstrates water loss beyond the "negligible impacts" specified as acceptable in their operating licence.
"Initially when the water levels dropped in the swamps the argument was that this was because we were in a drought period," she said.
"Or that the cracks in the stream-beds would fill up with sediment or heal, or that there wouldn’t be an impact to the surface water of the catchment."
But Dr Young says new evidence suggests the drinking water actually vanishes underground, and future planned longwalls will vastly increase catchment impacts.
"The water that goes down and is lost from the surface makes its way through a system of cracks down to the mine. And is completely lost," she added.
A BHP spokesperson has acknowledged "that impacts have occurred that are within approved conditions and localised", and confirmed that the mine meets all required standards.
Environmentalist Pepe Clarke, the CEO of the Nature Conservation Council of NSW, says poor regulatory decision-making is to blame.
"The Sydney Catchment Authority is responsible for managing our catchments to ensure we have high quality reliable water," he said.
"But that job is severely compromised by the fact that the catchment authority has no right to say no to coal mining, or coal seam gas development within the catchments.
"The decisions are made by the Department of Planning. And time and time again the Planning Department has put the economic interests of private companies ahead of the public interests in clean reliable water."
A Planning Department spokesman says some surface impacts are expected during mining, but they are "not currently aware of any breaches of the mine’s conditions of approval".
A team from the 7.30 NSW program visited a mining area known as 3A, where dying swamp vegetation, and cracked stream-beds and rock formations were observed.
An extended story and written responses will be posted at www.abc.net.au/730/nsw on Friday evening following broadcast.
Topics: water-supply, water-pollution, mining-rural, mining-environmental-issues, nsw
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