Groundwater
Groundwater exists underground in pores and crevices of rocks and soil known as aquifers. It supports a significant amount of agricultural activity, provides urban supplies to a number of town across Victoria and is an essential source of domestic and stock supply. Groundwater is also an important environmental asset that provides base flow to streams and supports wetlands and other groundwater dependent ecosystems.
Goulburn-Murray Water is responsible for managing groundwater resources and licensing bores in our region to ensure groundwater use is sustainable. G-MW also ensure that existing groundwater users and the environment are protected when new licences are considered.
The Department of Sustainability and Environment are responsible for coordinating groundwater management activities and providing groundwater policy direction across the State. For a listing of available literature, contact the Department of Sustainability and Environment.
Groundwater in Victoria
One in ten people in Victoria use groundwater - from private bores, springs or public water supplies - for at least part of their daily water supply. There are in excess of 74,000 bores extracting more than a quarter of a million megalitres of water each year.
Dependable groundwater supplies for stock and domestic bores are available at depths less than 50 metres in many areas of the state. A bore yield of at least 0.5 litres per second is usually needed for home use, though higher yields are more desirable.
More than 120,000 bores have been drilled across Victoria. Information including bore logs, groundwater levels and chemistry have been kept on a central Groundwater Database for more than 50,000 bores.
All of this information has been checked for reliability and pieced together with the data gained from strategic drilling programs during the 1970s and '80s to develop our understanding of our groundwater resources. The results are a series of maps, records and reports which detail many facets of groundwater and the associated geology.
This map provides an overview of Goulburn-Murray Water's Groundwater Management Areas/Water Supply Protection Areas.
