03-09-2002

A new, Internet-based interactive tool is now available from Australia's National Dryland Salinity Program (NDSP) to help land and water managers explore suitable engineering options in developing their salinity management plans.

Extensive research and development has shown the main engineering options for salinity management include groundwater pumping to manage discharge, surface drains to control recharge and sub-surface drainage to manage water tables. The most suitable option will depend on local factors, such as the groundwater flow system, soil and landscape properties, soil type and water disposal.

Recognising that plant-based solutions alone will be insufficient to control salinity in some cases, the NDSP contracted consultants Sinclair Knight Merz to develop a decision support tool that would allow salinity managers to identify potential engineering options for their local conditions.

The project has now collated the most up-to-date information available on engineering techniques for managing dryland salinity, along with a series of case studies from notable engineering projects. The on-line resource now forms the basis for an interactive decision support tool that accesses information on different options. The innovative tool applies basic modelling (using spreadsheets) of the various options to look at the potential impacts and the possible costs and benefits.

Sinclair Knight Merz Project Director, Martin Robinson, said individuals or organisations with an interest in dryland salinity management would benefit from the tool due to the detailed integration of management information at a number of levels.

'You can log in, click on a region on a map and see the engineering options considered relevant for the area,' he said. 'You can then search for more detailed information on a particular option, such as groundwater pumping, or go even further into the database to look at relevant case studies where a particular engineering option has been applied.

'The value of this tool is that it can be used in a very broad context, looking at the options across an entire region and also at a more local level,' he said.

NDSP National Manager Richard Price said the new tool recognised that integrated solutions were needed to solve the complex problems associated with dryland salinity.

'It confirms the importance of engineering techniques for certain situations, such as groundwater pumping and drainage in helping to solve dryland salinity problems,' Mr Price said.

'Land and water managers will need to consider local, and legal, factors as well as the cost of the exercise against the potential benefits when making decisions about the most appropriate engineering options for managing saline-affected areas.

'The decision support tool is not a detailed design tool, but it is a means of assisting land and water resource managers to make a decision as to what engineering approaches, if designed specifically for a site, could be effective,' he said.

Click here to access the engineering options new decision support tool.

The National Dryland Salinity Program (NDSP) is Australia's lead knowledge broker of research, development and extension efforts to combat the risk of dryland salinity to our land and water resources.

ENDS

For further information please contact:

Please contact Land & Water Australia
Email: land&wateraustralia@lwa.gov.au
Phone: 02 6263 6000