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Supervising Scientist Environmental Monitoring Program
Biological monitoring techniques have been developed that can be used to assess the environmental impact of uranium mining on aquatic ecosystems downstream of Ranger mine. Two broad approaches are used:
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on toxicity monitoring.
Figure A: Toxicity (creekside) monitoring results for freshwater snail egg production for wet seasons between 1992 and 2007. (Snail egg production data for the first three tests of 1995-96, all tests for 1997-98, 1998-99 and 1999-00 and the last four tests in 2000-01, were provided by ERA.) The final 3 and first data points for 2006-07 and 2007-08 respectively are the results from the trial in situ testing procedure - see explanatory notes for reasoning.
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on toxicity monitoring.
Figure B: Toxicity (creekside) monitoring results for larval black-banded rainbowfish survival, for wet seasons between 1992 and 2006. (Larval fish survival data for the second test in 1999/00 were provided by ERA.)
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on bioaccumulation.
Mean concentrations of uranium measured in mussel soft-parts, sediment and water samples collected from Mudginberri Billabong and control Billabongs 1979-2007.
226Ra activity concentrations in the dried flesh of freshwater mussels collected from Mudginberri Billabong 2000-2005 and control site, Sandy Billabong 2002-2005. The error bars represent ± one standard deviation.
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on bioaccumulation.
Mean concentrations of uranium measured in the flesh of forktail catfish, sediment and water samples collected from Mudginberri and Sandy Billabongs since 1981. Error bars represent standard error.
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on assessment of biodiversity.
Paired upstream-downstream dissimilarity values (using the Bray-Curtis measure) calculated for community structure of macroinvertebrate families in several streams in the vicinity of the Ranger uranium mine for the period 1988 to 2007. The dashed vertical lines delineate periods for which a different sampling and/or sample processing method was used. Dashed horizontal lines indicate mean dissimilarity across years.
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on assessment of biodiversity.
Paired control-exposed dissimilarity values (using the Bray-Curtis measure) calculated for community structure of fish in Mudginberri ('exposed') and Sandy ('control') billabongs in the vicinity of the Ranger uranium mine over time. Values are means (±standard error) of the 5 possible (randomly-selected) pairwise comparisons of transect data between the two billabongs. There has been a significant decline in paired-site dissimilarity over time but there is no evidence that this decline is mine-related.
The Supervising Scientist's interpretation of these data is available at Explanatory notes on assessment of biodiversity.
Paired control-exposed site dissimilarity values (using the Bray-Curtis measure) calculated for community structure of fish in ‘directly-exposed’ Magela and ‘control’ Nourlangie and Magela Billabongs in the vicinity of the Ranger uranium mine over time. Values are means (± standard error) of the 5 possible (randomly-selected) pairwise comparisons of average trap enclosure data between the pairwise billabong comparisons, Coonjimba-Buba, Gulungul- Wirnmuyurr and Georgetown-Sandy Billabongs.