Program Leaders:
Dr Katharina Fabricius, Australian Institute of Marine Science
Professor Richard Pearson, James Cook University
Dr Iain Gordon, CSIRO
The quality of water entering the Great Barrier Reef lagoon has
been declining and is negatively affecting the condition of its
ecosystems. There is an urgent need to elevate our certainty
about the effectiveness of actions taken under the Reef Water
Quality Protection Plan (Reef Plan), and for improved
scientific understanding of how the condition of freshwater,
estuarine and marine ecosystems are linked to terrestrial
processes.
Program 7 consists of three main areas:
-
Marine and estuarine water quality;
-
Freshwater water quality; and
-
Ecosystem and social frameworks for water quality.
The main outcome of this Program is to identify robust
indicators for water quality in freshwater, estuarine and marine
ecosystems which will enable the development of tools to improve
water quality specific monitoring and determine pollutant
thresholds of potential concern for exposure of selected
bioindicators. This information will be integrated with
economic and social drivers of land-use management that influence
water quality to produce an Integrated Report Card framework for
water quality. The Program will collaborate with the relevant
managing agencies of the Reef Plan and user groups to assimilate
data from multiple sources into a simplified report card for Great
Barrier Reef catchments. This information will form a
significant part of the water quality reporting under the Reef
Plan.
Program 7 will also develop catchment-specific tracers for
improved understanding of the links between terrestrial and marine
water quality, and for identification of Great Barrier Reef lagoon
areas at greatest risk of exposure to land-based pollutants.
The tracer project will characterise and obtain a distinct
isotopic, elemental, physical, and mineralogical 'fingerprint' of
the fine sediments (mud fraction) delivered to the Great Barrier
Reef within selected wet tropics and dry tropics catchments.
In addition, the Program 7 will develop predictive tools to
assess the impacts of changes in land use, management and climate
on the flow, water quality regimes and ecological dynamics of the
wetlands and floodplains of catchments adjacent to the Great
Barrier Reef. There is a considerable gap in our current
understanding of ecological connectivity between coastal wetlands
and reef and the impact declining water quality has on this
important linkage.
Two projects conducted as independent
processes in Year 1 of the
MTSRF Program was brought together in Year 2 to strengthen the
delivery and outcomes for end user needs regarding social and
economic considerations for improving water quality in the
GBR. The amalgamation of these critical research components
has resulted in greater benefit from work conducted by enabling
stronger linkages between catchment based activities, water quality
and climate to be established. Year 3 of the program explored
sustainable environmental targets and associated land use and land
management patterns in linked terrestrial and marine ecosystems in
the Dry Tropics. This included the assessment of instruments
promoting the adoption of land use and land management
patterns.
The e-Atlas will
provide a mechanism by which data collated through this program can
be assimilated with other data sources and interpreted for relevant
management and reporting needs for water quality in the Great
Barrier Reef.
