Territory Stories

Assessment of the Jabiluka Project : report of the Supervising Scientist to the World Heritage Committee

Details:

Title

Assessment of the Jabiluka Project : report of the Supervising Scientist to the World Heritage Committee

Creator

Johnston, A.; Prendergast, J. B.; Bridgewater, Peter

Collection

E-Publications; E-Books; PublicationNT; Supervising Scientist Report; 138

Date

1999

Location

Alligator Rivers Region

Table of contents

Main report--Appendix 2 of the Main Report. Submission to the Mission of the World Heritage Committee by some Australian Scientists ... --Attachment A. Johnston A. and Needham S. 1999. Protection of the environment near the Ranger uranium mine--Attachment B. Bureau of Meteorology 1999. Hydrometeorological analysis relevant to Jabiluka--Attachment C. Jones, R.N., Hennessy, K.J. and Abbs, D.J. 1999. Climate change analysis relevant to Jabiluka--Attachment D. Chiew, F and Wang, Q.J. 1999. Hydrological anaysis relevant to surface water storage at Jabiluka--Attachment E. Kalf, F. and Dudgeon, C. 1999. Analysis of long term groundwater dispersal of contaminants from proposed Jabiluka mine tailings repositories--Appendix 2 of Attachment E. Simulation of leaching on non-reactive and radionuclide contaminants from proposed Jabiluka silo banks.

Language

English

Subject

Uranium mill tailings - Environmental aspects - Northern Territory - Alligator Rivers Region; Environmental impact analysis - Northern Territory - Jabiluka; Uranium mines and mining - Environmental aspects - Northern Territory - Jabiluka; Jabiluka - Environmental aspects

Publisher name

Environment Australia

Place of publication

Canberra (A.C.T.)

Series

Supervising Scientist Report; 138

Format

1 volume (various pagings) : illustrations, maps

File type

application/pdf

ISBN

642243417

Use

Copyright

Copyright owner

Environment Australia

License

https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2019C00042

Parent handle

https://hdl.handle.net/10070/264982

Citation address

https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462402

Related items

https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462403; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462400; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462405; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462406; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462408; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462409; https://hdl.handle.net/10070/462411

Page content

47 runoff is the same as that estimated using the above runoff coefficients. Although the total estimated runoff is the same, the model allows for higher runoff coefficients during wet periods because the soil is closer to saturation. Pond evaporation Based upon the analysis presented in section 3.3, monthly evaporation data were obtained from the Jabiru Airport record for pan evaporation from 1971 to 1998 and the application of the pan factors of Vardavas (1987). A very simple algorithm, which included the results presented in section 3.3 on the cross-correlation between monthly rainfall and monthly evaporation, was used to generate monthly pan evaporation data. The monthly pan evaporation data generation algorithm is described in Appendix B of Chiew and Wang (1999). The monthly pan coefficients of Vardavas (1987) were then applied. Daily variation in evaporation within a given month was not considered in the water balance simulation. To evaluate the algorithm, statistics from 1000 years of generated monthly pan evaporation were compared with the statistics from the observed data. Table 5.2.1 summarises the monthly statistics; a summary of annual statistics is presented in Chiew and Wang (1999). The generated data closely reproduce the observed mean and coefficients of variation for all monthly and annual values. The skewness is not well reproduced because of the large uncertainties in the skewness estimated from only 27 years of observed data. This is reflected in the irregular fluctuation of skewness from month to month. In any case, the skewness in the data is not important because of the relatively small coefficients of variation. The cross-correlation between the generated annual pan evaporation and rainfall is 0.41 in close agreement with the observed cross correlation of 0.43. Table 5.2.1 Comparison of key monthly pan evaporation statistics in the generated and observed data Mean (mm) CV Skewness Observed Simulated Observed Simulated Observed Simulated All data 218 219 0.20 0.19 0.29 0.27 Jan 184 186 0.13 0.12 -0.11 0.01 Feb 156 151 0.15 0.13 0.10 -0.13 Mar 175 175 0.11 0.12 0.61 -0.06 Apr 203 204 0.11 0.11 0.11 -0.20 May 216 216 0.07 0.07 -0.22 -0.41 Jun 204 205 0.07 0.07 0.65 -0.06 Jul 216 216 0.08 0.08 0.72 -0.09 Aug 247 247 0.07 0.07 0.19 -0.03 Sep 268 268 0.08 0.08 1.02 -0.12 Oct 288 287 0.10 0.10 0.59 -0.44 Nov 244 246 0.11 0.11 -0.05 -0.07 Dec 212 214 0.12 0.12 -0.18 -0.11 Rainfall On the basis of the assessment presented in section 3.2, the Oenpelli rainfall record from 1911 until 1998 was adopted in the hydrological modelling of the Jabiluka water management system.