A former Gunnedah councillor believes the proposed Shenhua mine could place Gunnedah's water supply "in peril" if it goes ahead.
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Leon Mills shared his "grave concerns" in Breeza on Wednesday, at a press conference hosted by Caroona Coal Action Group after a report found "highly significant inconsistencies" in data in the Chinese company's environmental impact statement (EIS).
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"Gunnedah town has a water supply that is probably the envy of not only Australia but probably the world. We do not have, at this point in time, any problems with water," he said.
"As it approaches Gunnedah, between Breeza and Gunnedah, the flow of the Mooki goes into the alluvium ... [and] that alluvium that the Mooki appears to go into is in the vicinity of where Gunnedah gets its water supply from.
"Does anyone share my feeling that the Gunnedah water supply is being placed in peril as a result of the Shenhua mine?"
The report on Shenhua's water modelling was commissioned by CCAG and compiled by the University of NSW.
In a statement to the NVI, a Shenhua spokesperson said the water modelling in its EIS had been reviewed by "the panel of the nation's best water experts (the IESC), as well as four other expert reviewers" and "these experts have all agreed that the modelling is robust and can be relied on to predict any impacts on water".
"Confined aquifers, in the context of the Watermark Project, are the coal seams. Unconfined aquifers in the vicinity of the Watermark Project include alluvial aquifers. Water extracted from the ground for local agriculture, or for stock and domestic purposes, is drawn from alluvial aquifers. Water held within coal seams is not used for irrigation, stock or domestic uses," the spokesperson said.
Mr Mills accused Gunnedah Shire Council of "navel-gazing" on the issue but, when NVI asked the council for comment, a spokesperson said "it would not be appropriate for council to comment on this document as it is the state government that is the determining authority for this development".
CCAG committee member Graeme Norman said Gunnedah's groundwater was "definitely going to have quality problems" because "if the shire was listening, they would realise that Shenhua's EIS states that the salt load in the Mooki [River] will increase by 400 per cent".
He said the Gunnedah shire obtains its groundwater from a series of bores, which are fed by aquifers and "much of the recharge area for those bores is in and around this ridge" where Shenhua is proposing to mine.
"You will then have increased salt levels in the bore water and ultimately it will affect the 10,000 residents that are using that town supply," Mr Norman said.
"We know it's going to increase ... Once it gets into the groundwater and it become brackish, it becomes unsuitable for crops, unsuitable for spraying, unsuitable for consumption either by livestock or humans - so it would be a tragedy, it would be a catastrophe if the quality of our groundwater was unduly affected."
