A late afternoon view of the River Murray at Renmark, South Australia.

A late afternoon view of the River Murray at Renmark, South Australia.

New solutions to water management issues

We aim to find new, integrated solutions to water supply and management issues.

  • 14 October 2008 | Updated 14 October 2011

Our researchers are taking an integrated view of water resource management.

What we do

We aim to find new solutions to water supply and management issues that consider:

  • quantity and quality of water
  • surface and groundwater processes
  • resource security
  • environmental security
  • urban and rural agricultural uses. 

How we do it

We research future threats and opportunities for regional water supplies. 

Our researchers are taking an integrated view of water resource management.

These include:

  • land use change
  • salinity
  • climate change
  • groundwater extraction
  • drainage schemes.

CSIRO also investigates catchment management and engineering options for surface water, groundwater and salinity to protect landuse and reclaim aquatic environments.

Our skills and expertise

Hydrology

  • Developing tools for sustainable water reuse, including recycling and reuse of drainage and agricultural/horticultural wastewaters
  • Developing new isotope and tracer techniques and their application in groundwater systems and models
  • Developing modelling tools and techniques for irrigation performance, riverand groundwater sytems, catchment hydrology, regional scale systems and imapact of climate variability and climate change.

Environmental Observation and Landscape Science

  • Building the technological backbone for the development of an Australian Water Resources Observation Network (WRON)
  • Developing modelling tools and techniques for soil-plant-climate systems
  • Using remote sensing to improve observations of surface soil moisture, precipitation and land cover
    Delivering hydrologic and natural resource data via web service technologies and open standards
  • Advanced visualisation and reporting techniques that use 3D spatial visualisation.

Catchment and Aquatic Systems

  • Ecological monitoring, analysis and modelling of aquatic food webs
  • Designing specialised techniques and models to trace, date and track transported sediments and nutrients
  • Quantifying nutrient cycles and greenhouse gas emissions as a function of different agricultural practices and environmental factors
  • Developing predictive models which determine the likely changes in physical habitat throughout the system in response to changes in climate and land management.

Urban and Industrial Water

  • Developing water reuse systems through managed aquifer recharge and aquifer storage and recovery
  • Monitoring chemical and microbial changes in water quality during recycling of stormwater and effluent
  • Developing advanced analytical methods for assessing risk profiles of partially degraded organic pollutants
  • Developing information management systems and technologies for sewer and water networks.

Environmental Biogeochemistry

  • Detecting and quantifying contaminants in aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems and predicting contaminant transformations, transport and fate in the environment
  • Understanding the effects of contaminants on biota and assessing and controlling risk
  • Developing sediment quality assessment techniques
  • Environmental and criminal forensic techniques for soils, waters and sediments
  • Developing advanced techniques in ecotoxicology and microbiology to assess impact of contaminants.

Projects

Our expertise has been used in some nationally sigificant projects:

  • Providing a comprehensive scientific assessment of water yield in all major water systems across the country for the National Water Commission to allow a consistent analytical framework for water policy decisions across the nation (Sustainable Yields)
  • Building the technological backbone for the development of an Australian Water Resources Observation Network (WRON)
  • Forming the CLLAMMecology Research Cluster, with partners, to evaluate water management options for the Coorong, Lower Lakes and Murray Mouth region
  • Establishing the Water Information Research and Development Alliance (WIRADA) with the Bureau of Meteorology
  • Forming the Urban Water Security Research Alliance, with partners, to address South-East Queensland's emerging urban water issues
  • Being a member of the Heartlands consortium which is investigating new land management options that will be effective in repairing and preventing environmental damage to the Murray-Darling Basin
  • Developing alternative urban water supply options through research into innovative water recycling methods.

Learn more about how we are Managing Water Resources.