Tuesday 21 June 2022 11:17 PM Scientists demand for new dam projects to be STOPPED in Australia trends now
Scientists are urging that major dam projects in NSW and Queensland be abandoned, warning of significant environmental and agricultural consequences.
ANU Professor Jamie Pittock, a member of the Wentworth group of concerned scientists, will tell a conference on Wednesday the dam proposals are a waste of taxpayers money.
They include NSW government plans to expand Wyangala near Cowra and build Dungowan dam near Tamworth. While a plan for a dam at Hells Gates in Northern Queensland remains under consideration.
'The proposal to raise Wyangala Dam is an exemplar of why these dam building projects are crazy, it was proposed without a business case,' Professor Pittock told AAP.
Scientists are urging that major dam projects in NSW and Queensland be abandoned, warning of significant environmental and agricultural consequences
Professor Pittock, who has studied water policy for two decades, says the proposals are 'unjustified and ill conceived water management interventions', and has called on the federal government to abandon them.
'There are better ways at reducing flood risk and better ways for securing water for agriculture.'
Farmers, traditional owners, scientists and politicians have told a two-day Listening To The Lachlan conference about the impact expanding dam will have on the river.
Internationally renowned expert on Australia's water resources Richard Kingsford also wants the projects abandoned.
The UNSW professor will tell the conference the NSW dam proposals will devastate the wetlands downstream on the Lachlan River.
'People don't know how magnificent places like Lake Cowal, the Great Cumbung Swamp and the Booligal wetlands are, but I've been surveying them for more than a decade,' he told AAP.
'Native fish, waterbirds, frogs, river red gums will decline in
