Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2020.1745735
K. Allen, P. Hope, D. Lam, J. Brown, R. Wasson
ABSTRACT Extreme rainfall is projected to increase with climate change, but the impact of climate change on floods is uncertain. Infrastructure design based on information available from short gauged time series (typically ~30 – 80 years) may not take account of the full range of possible flood events, or be suitable for identifying non-stationarity. Australian palaeoflood and palaeo-hydroclimate records drawn from a wide variety of natural archives and documentary sources suggest that Australia has been subjected to larger flood events in the past; a pluvial period for eastern Australia in the eighteenth Century is particularly note-worthy. If the current infrastructure is inadequate for past floods, it is unlikely it will adequately mitigate future floods. We discuss how improved awareness, and incorporation, of palaeoflood records in risk estimates could help guide infrastructure planning and design, flood event prediction and inform flood mitigation policy. This is particularly relevant for Australia with its notoriously variable hydroclimate.
{"title":"Improving Australia’s flood record for planning purposes – can we do better?","authors":"K. Allen, P. Hope, D. Lam, J. Brown, R. Wasson","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2020.1745735","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2020.1745735","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Extreme rainfall is projected to increase with climate change, but the impact of climate change on floods is uncertain. Infrastructure design based on information available from short gauged time series (typically ~30 – 80 years) may not take account of the full range of possible flood events, or be suitable for identifying non-stationarity. Australian palaeoflood and palaeo-hydroclimate records drawn from a wide variety of natural archives and documentary sources suggest that Australia has been subjected to larger flood events in the past; a pluvial period for eastern Australia in the eighteenth Century is particularly note-worthy. If the current infrastructure is inadequate for past floods, it is unlikely it will adequately mitigate future floods. We discuss how improved awareness, and incorporation, of palaeoflood records in risk estimates could help guide infrastructure planning and design, flood event prediction and inform flood mitigation policy. This is particularly relevant for Australia with its notoriously variable hydroclimate.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"24 1","pages":"36 - 45"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2020.1745735","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46979822","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2020.1746174
A. Gunawardena, S. Iftekhar, James Fogarty
ABSTRACT The positive impacts of water sensitive urban investments on the environment, community well-being, and lifestyles are widely recognised, but the process of formally quantifying these intangible benefits remains an underdeveloped research area. The monetary value of intangible benefits can be estimated using non-market valuation techniques. Here, we provide a review of over 190 existing non-market valuation studies related to water sensitive urban systems and practices that have reported dollar value estimates for intangible benefits. The empirical evidence suggests that communities are willing to make financial contributions towards projects that deliver intangible benefits. As such, incorporating the intangible benefits of water sensitive urban systems and practices into project evaluation processes is important. Unfortunately, attempts to evaluate water-sensitive urban projects based on both tangible and intangible benefits are rare. The summary and synthesis of existing research in this area is presented in the hope that it will facilitate greater use of intangible benefits in project evaluations.
{"title":"Quantifying intangible benefits of water sensitive urban systems and practices: an overview of non-market valuation studies","authors":"A. Gunawardena, S. Iftekhar, James Fogarty","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2020.1746174","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2020.1746174","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The positive impacts of water sensitive urban investments on the environment, community well-being, and lifestyles are widely recognised, but the process of formally quantifying these intangible benefits remains an underdeveloped research area. The monetary value of intangible benefits can be estimated using non-market valuation techniques. Here, we provide a review of over 190 existing non-market valuation studies related to water sensitive urban systems and practices that have reported dollar value estimates for intangible benefits. The empirical evidence suggests that communities are willing to make financial contributions towards projects that deliver intangible benefits. As such, incorporating the intangible benefits of water sensitive urban systems and practices into project evaluation processes is important. Unfortunately, attempts to evaluate water-sensitive urban projects based on both tangible and intangible benefits are rare. The summary and synthesis of existing research in this area is presented in the hope that it will facilitate greater use of intangible benefits in project evaluations.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"24 1","pages":"46 - 59"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2020.1746174","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41956865","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2020.1733743
T. McMahon, C. Petheram
ABSTRACT There has been a resurgence of interest in the construction of large dams worldwide. This study examined many dams from around the world (>10,000) and compared them to a comprehensive dataset developed for Australia (224) to provide insights that might otherwise not be apparent from examining just one or several dams. The dam datasets (ICOLD and ANCOLD) largely confirm existing narratives on Australian dam construction. Compared to dams from Rest of the World (RoW), Australian dams were found to: have larger reservoir capacities and spillway capacities for a given catchment area; have higher dam walls for a given capacity; and result in higher degrees of river regulation. A range of general relationships among reservoir capacities, reservoir surface areas, and catchment areas are presented which can be used in reconnaissance or pre-feasibility studies and for global hydrologic modelling when dam and reservoir information are required as input.
{"title":"Australian dams and reservoirs within a global setting","authors":"T. McMahon, C. Petheram","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2020.1733743","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2020.1733743","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT There has been a resurgence of interest in the construction of large dams worldwide. This study examined many dams from around the world (>10,000) and compared them to a comprehensive dataset developed for Australia (224) to provide insights that might otherwise not be apparent from examining just one or several dams. The dam datasets (ICOLD and ANCOLD) largely confirm existing narratives on Australian dam construction. Compared to dams from Rest of the World (RoW), Australian dams were found to: have larger reservoir capacities and spillway capacities for a given catchment area; have higher dam walls for a given capacity; and result in higher degrees of river regulation. A range of general relationships among reservoir capacities, reservoir surface areas, and catchment areas are presented which can be used in reconnaissance or pre-feasibility studies and for global hydrologic modelling when dam and reservoir information are required as input.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"24 1","pages":"12 - 35"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2020.1733743","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47795911","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2020.1717694
J. Alexandra, C. Finlayson
Australia’s mega-fires of 2019–2020 have burnt over ten millions of hectares 1 – almost twice the size of the 2019 Amazon fires (; Woodward 2020). Forested mountain ranges across the country – the ...
{"title":"Floods after bushfires: rapid responses for reducing impacts of sediment, ash, and nutrient slugs","authors":"J. Alexandra, C. Finlayson","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2020.1717694","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2020.1717694","url":null,"abstract":"Australia’s mega-fires of 2019–2020 have burnt over ten millions of hectares 1 – almost twice the size of the 2019 Amazon fires (; Woodward 2020). Forested mountain ranges across the country – the ...","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"24 1","pages":"11 - 9"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2020.1717694","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45584220","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-01-02DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2020.1780732
K. Daniell
ABSTRACT The dual nature of water – giver of life and massive disruptor – is not new. There is rarely one equilibrium state for a water system; there are multiple different states natural water systems cycle through. And human-induced changes to water systems, including through the use of technologies to modify and exploit them, and through climate change, further accentuate the opportunities for extreme disruptions to society. Human history is dotted with examples of challenges in managing water systems and disruptions. This year, parts of Australasia have seen widespread drought, massive fires, smoke pollution, ecological destruction, hail storms, cyclones and now a pandemic, COVID-19, protection from which requires adequate safe water and space for hygiene and limiting transmission. Our notions of time, space and connection to others and our environment, including water, have again come into focus as we search for a new equilibrium after this wave of disruptions – a ‘new normal’. But is this just a very human desire for stability amid the seeming chaos? Instead, do we instead need to get better at managing more appropriately through the ‘old abnormal’: the continuous variability, change and increasingly extreme events due in part to human modification and societal expansion across the planet? This editorial paper provides a reflection on the moment we have found ourselves in at the beginning of 2020. It draws together insights from a range of water science and management challenges presented in the papers of this issue, in order to chart some positive ways for more appropriately navigating water systems and their future disruptions.
{"title":"Water systems and disruptions: the ‘old abnormal’?","authors":"K. Daniell","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2020.1780732","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2020.1780732","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The dual nature of water – giver of life and massive disruptor – is not new. There is rarely one equilibrium state for a water system; there are multiple different states natural water systems cycle through. And human-induced changes to water systems, including through the use of technologies to modify and exploit them, and through climate change, further accentuate the opportunities for extreme disruptions to society. Human history is dotted with examples of challenges in managing water systems and disruptions. This year, parts of Australasia have seen widespread drought, massive fires, smoke pollution, ecological destruction, hail storms, cyclones and now a pandemic, COVID-19, protection from which requires adequate safe water and space for hygiene and limiting transmission. Our notions of time, space and connection to others and our environment, including water, have again come into focus as we search for a new equilibrium after this wave of disruptions – a ‘new normal’. But is this just a very human desire for stability amid the seeming chaos? Instead, do we instead need to get better at managing more appropriately through the ‘old abnormal’: the continuous variability, change and increasingly extreme events due in part to human modification and societal expansion across the planet? This editorial paper provides a reflection on the moment we have found ourselves in at the beginning of 2020. It draws together insights from a range of water science and management challenges presented in the papers of this issue, in order to chart some positive ways for more appropriately navigating water systems and their future disruptions.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"24 1","pages":"1 - 8"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2020-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2020.1780732","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42020308","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-07-03DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2019.1664878
M. Colloff, J. Pittock
ABSTRACT Narratives emerging from the interaction between science and policy set the common language for understanding complex environmental issues. We explore discourses of contestation over a major environmental policy, the Murray–Darling Basin Plan, intended to re-allocate irrigation water to restore the environment in south-eastern Australia. We examine three areas of scientific knowledge and decision-making at the science-policy interface: (1) water accounting and availability; (2) perspectives on ecological change and (3) issues of trust and the management of environmental water. Engagement and communication between scientists, bureaucrats and the public forms the basis for understanding contestation: over different sets of values, expectations of what scientists can deliver, perceptions of risk and uncertainty, interpretation of conflicting messages and economic development versus conservation. The Basin Plan was shaped by institutional processes not designed to account for such differences and has inadvertently promoted contestation through exclusion of world views that do not fit those of the decision makers. We consider how the Basin Plan can be re-framed by changing the values, rules and knowledge that set the decision context. These changes enable the Basin Plan to be re-conceptualised from a problem to be solved to an idea that can mobilise imaginative engagement by agents with diverse perspectives.
{"title":"Why we disagree about the Murray–Darling Basin Plan: water reform, environmental knowledge and the science-policy decision context","authors":"M. Colloff, J. Pittock","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2019.1664878","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2019.1664878","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Narratives emerging from the interaction between science and policy set the common language for understanding complex environmental issues. We explore discourses of contestation over a major environmental policy, the Murray–Darling Basin Plan, intended to re-allocate irrigation water to restore the environment in south-eastern Australia. We examine three areas of scientific knowledge and decision-making at the science-policy interface: (1) water accounting and availability; (2) perspectives on ecological change and (3) issues of trust and the management of environmental water. Engagement and communication between scientists, bureaucrats and the public forms the basis for understanding contestation: over different sets of values, expectations of what scientists can deliver, perceptions of risk and uncertainty, interpretation of conflicting messages and economic development versus conservation. The Basin Plan was shaped by institutional processes not designed to account for such differences and has inadvertently promoted contestation through exclusion of world views that do not fit those of the decision makers. We consider how the Basin Plan can be re-framed by changing the values, rules and knowledge that set the decision context. These changes enable the Basin Plan to be re-conceptualised from a problem to be solved to an idea that can mobilise imaginative engagement by agents with diverse perspectives.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"23 1","pages":"88 - 98"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2019-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2019.1664878","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44087839","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-07-03DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2019.1669970
R. French, M. Jones
No doubt the authors’ paper was received with many mutterings of ‘You have to be out of your cottonpickin’ minds, Piglets. I’ve been doing flood frequency analyses since I was in three-cornered pants and the idea that floods come in cycles has to be total bovine excrement!’ It is understandable that longterm compliance with Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Pattison 1977; Pilgrim 1987; Ball et al. 2016) could result in practitioners truly believing that annual floods are perfectly random entities and that they always occur according to the Log-Pearson Type III (LP3) distribution. That statistical distribution, first devised in 1888 by Pearson to describe skewed data, has come to us through five U.S. studies from 1966 to 1982, after which Stedinger and Griffis (2008) commented: ‘Bobée and Ashkar (1991, 76) observe that since the official adoption of the LP3 distribution in the United States and Australia, “its application to the study of floods has been both extensive and widespread.” Still a concern is whether the adopted LP3 distribution with log-space moments is a good choice . . . the true distribution will never be known.’ Bypassing that philosophical profundity in favour of practicality, Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) continues to follow U.S. practice in its Book 3 Chapter 2 and encapsulates it in TUFLOWFlike flood frequency software. Since then, the U.S. has produced Bulletin 17C (England et al. 2018) to strengthen a number of identified areas of weakness and has resulted in USGS PeakFQ version 7.1 and USACE HEC-SSP 2.1 software. But with all its tweaking, the LP3 distribution is not omnipotent. Under the sub-heading Decadal Trends in Annual Peak Streamflow, Mastin et al. (2016, 12) declare: ‘In the Pacific Northwest region, decadal shifts in precipitation are linked to atmospheric circulation and sea surface temperatures (Cayan et al. 1998). As result, decadal trends in annual peak flows are evident at many sites’ as shown by their Figure 7. It appears that the semicyclicity of flooding is the new reality for flood hydrologists. An examination of LP3-advocating Bulletin 17C flood records at 01134500 Moose River at Victory VT suggests the biggest floods may occur on a 20-year semi-cycle on the U.S. East Coast (England et al. 2018, Table 10.3). And it is not that Australians are ignorant of the lumpiness of flooding. Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) Book 3 Chapter 2.2.1 states: ‘Climate may experience pseudo-periodic shifts that persist over periods lasting from several years to several decades. There is growing evidence that parts of Australia are subject to such forcing and that this significantly affects flood risk . . . practitioners are therefore advised to keep abreast of new developments.’ Questions for the authors are:
{"title":"Discussion on 'Large floods in South East Queensland: is it valid to assume they occur randomly?' by GM McMahon and AS Kiem","authors":"R. French, M. Jones","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2019.1669970","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669970","url":null,"abstract":"No doubt the authors’ paper was received with many mutterings of ‘You have to be out of your cottonpickin’ minds, Piglets. I’ve been doing flood frequency analyses since I was in three-cornered pants and the idea that floods come in cycles has to be total bovine excrement!’ It is understandable that longterm compliance with Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Pattison 1977; Pilgrim 1987; Ball et al. 2016) could result in practitioners truly believing that annual floods are perfectly random entities and that they always occur according to the Log-Pearson Type III (LP3) distribution. That statistical distribution, first devised in 1888 by Pearson to describe skewed data, has come to us through five U.S. studies from 1966 to 1982, after which Stedinger and Griffis (2008) commented: ‘Bobée and Ashkar (1991, 76) observe that since the official adoption of the LP3 distribution in the United States and Australia, “its application to the study of floods has been both extensive and widespread.” Still a concern is whether the adopted LP3 distribution with log-space moments is a good choice . . . the true distribution will never be known.’ Bypassing that philosophical profundity in favour of practicality, Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) continues to follow U.S. practice in its Book 3 Chapter 2 and encapsulates it in TUFLOWFlike flood frequency software. Since then, the U.S. has produced Bulletin 17C (England et al. 2018) to strengthen a number of identified areas of weakness and has resulted in USGS PeakFQ version 7.1 and USACE HEC-SSP 2.1 software. But with all its tweaking, the LP3 distribution is not omnipotent. Under the sub-heading Decadal Trends in Annual Peak Streamflow, Mastin et al. (2016, 12) declare: ‘In the Pacific Northwest region, decadal shifts in precipitation are linked to atmospheric circulation and sea surface temperatures (Cayan et al. 1998). As result, decadal trends in annual peak flows are evident at many sites’ as shown by their Figure 7. It appears that the semicyclicity of flooding is the new reality for flood hydrologists. An examination of LP3-advocating Bulletin 17C flood records at 01134500 Moose River at Victory VT suggests the biggest floods may occur on a 20-year semi-cycle on the U.S. East Coast (England et al. 2018, Table 10.3). And it is not that Australians are ignorant of the lumpiness of flooding. Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) Book 3 Chapter 2.2.1 states: ‘Climate may experience pseudo-periodic shifts that persist over periods lasting from several years to several decades. There is growing evidence that parts of Australia are subject to such forcing and that this significantly affects flood risk . . . practitioners are therefore advised to keep abreast of new developments.’ Questions for the authors are:","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"23 1","pages":"148 - 149"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2019-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669970","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41686038","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-07-03DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2019.1669952
R. French, M. Jones
It would be no surprise to practitioners of the noble art of flood design to learn from the authors’ paper that New Zealand’s hydrologic practice has parallels with Australia’s, as is the case for many other specialist sciences and technologies. A brief Australian history of temporal patterns different from that in Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) Book 2 Chapter 5.2.3 may give some context to both the authors’ paper and this discussion.
{"title":"Discussion on 'Temporal patterns for design hyetographs in New Zealand' by SK Singh, GA Griffiths and AI McKerchar","authors":"R. French, M. Jones","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2019.1669952","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669952","url":null,"abstract":"It would be no surprise to practitioners of the noble art of flood design to learn from the authors’ paper that New Zealand’s hydrologic practice has parallels with Australia’s, as is the case for many other specialist sciences and technologies. A brief Australian history of temporal patterns different from that in Australian Rainfall and Runoff (Ball et al. 2016) Book 2 Chapter 5.2.3 may give some context to both the authors’ paper and this discussion.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"23 1","pages":"153 - 155"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2019-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669952","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48801665","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-07-03DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2019.1696033
K. Daniell, T. Daniell
ABSTRACT Australia’s water management futures are again under discussion as drought impacts and bushfires hit communities. Water and ecological system limits are being reached resulting in fish kills and dwindling water levels in storages. Awareness is also rising around the inequities in current water governance regimes for First Peoples across the Australian continent and beyond. Here we provide a brief overview and research on: the ingenuity of Indigenous waterscape and landscape knowledge and practices to care for country and community, including the development of agricultural systems and sophisticated fish and eel trapping systems that are thousands of years old; the devastating impacts of colonisation on First Peoples, their country and ability to maintain some cultural practices; and the ongoing contestation over water governance, right from Federation, including the eight waves of water reforms in the Murray-Darling Basin. Current challenges and needs for reform are also presented including: hydrological scientific uncertainties, such as around return flows and their adjustment due to irrigation infrastructure efficiency increases, and new design methodologies, such as for flood estimation inputs to hydraulic models; adjusting current governance regimes of sustainable diversion limits and water markets to provide alternative value to Australia, beyond economic value drivers, that better respond to the benefit of all basin communities in the face of ongoing extreme climate variability and climate change; and determining positive ways forward for truly valuing and allowing First Peoples’ knowledge, practices, culture and law to provide a basis for developing the next waves of Australia's water management reform journey.
{"title":"What’s next for Australia’s water management?","authors":"K. Daniell, T. Daniell","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2019.1696033","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2019.1696033","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Australia’s water management futures are again under discussion as drought impacts and bushfires hit communities. Water and ecological system limits are being reached resulting in fish kills and dwindling water levels in storages. Awareness is also rising around the inequities in current water governance regimes for First Peoples across the Australian continent and beyond. Here we provide a brief overview and research on: the ingenuity of Indigenous waterscape and landscape knowledge and practices to care for country and community, including the development of agricultural systems and sophisticated fish and eel trapping systems that are thousands of years old; the devastating impacts of colonisation on First Peoples, their country and ability to maintain some cultural practices; and the ongoing contestation over water governance, right from Federation, including the eight waves of water reforms in the Murray-Darling Basin. Current challenges and needs for reform are also presented including: hydrological scientific uncertainties, such as around return flows and their adjustment due to irrigation infrastructure efficiency increases, and new design methodologies, such as for flood estimation inputs to hydraulic models; adjusting current governance regimes of sustainable diversion limits and water markets to provide alternative value to Australia, beyond economic value drivers, that better respond to the benefit of all basin communities in the face of ongoing extreme climate variability and climate change; and determining positive ways forward for truly valuing and allowing First Peoples’ knowledge, practices, culture and law to provide a basis for developing the next waves of Australia's water management reform journey.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"23 1","pages":"69 - 77"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2019-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2019.1696033","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49127444","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-07-03DOI: 10.1080/13241583.2019.1669972
A. Kiem, G. McMahon
As explained in Section 7.2 of McMahon and Kiem (2018a), ‘to conduct the more rigorous statistical analysis required to formally prove or disprove, the hypothesis of a nominal 40 year cycle in South East Queensland (SEQ) flooding at least 25–30 samples of 40 year periods containing annual maximum flow data would be required. That corresponds to 1000–1200 years of data which are obviously not available and is the reason simple tests are used in Sections 3–5’.
{"title":"Response to Robert French’s discussion on “Large floods in South East Queensland: is it valid to assume they occur randomly”","authors":"A. Kiem, G. McMahon","doi":"10.1080/13241583.2019.1669972","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669972","url":null,"abstract":"As explained in Section 7.2 of McMahon and Kiem (2018a), ‘to conduct the more rigorous statistical analysis required to formally prove or disprove, the hypothesis of a nominal 40 year cycle in South East Queensland (SEQ) flooding at least 25–30 samples of 40 year periods containing annual maximum flow data would be required. That corresponds to 1000–1200 years of data which are obviously not available and is the reason simple tests are used in Sections 3–5’.","PeriodicalId":51870,"journal":{"name":"Australasian Journal of Water Resources","volume":"23 1","pages":"150 - 152"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2019-07-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/13241583.2019.1669972","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48679113","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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