3.1.2.3 Assessment of cumulative developments

BAs are designed to analyse the cumulative impacts of coal resource developments. The baseline and CRDP may each consider a suite of developments, the potential impacts of which may overlap to varying degrees in both time and space. This allows users of an assessment to predict and understand the cumulative hydrological changes and potential impacts of those developments on surface water, groundwater and water-dependent assets. In some cases, the spatial or temporal alignment of certain coal resource developments may allow for some attribution of potential effects to individual developments, but is due to this alignment rather than by design.

The hydrological modelling results are reported for each grid cell individually. The maximum hydrological change in each grid cell occurs at different times across the area assessed, and the year of maximum change under the baseline does not necessarily coincide with the year of maximum change due to additional coal resource development. Therefore, adding these two results in a hydrological change that is unlikely to eventuate.