Stanley residents fail to stop farmer mining groundwater that is sold on as bottled springwaterResidents from a tiny Victorian town have been ordered to pay $90,000 in legal costs after they launched a failed bid to prevent a farmer from extracting and selling groundwater as bottled springwater to a subsidiary of the Japanese beverage giant Asahi. Ed Tyrie, chairman of Stanley Rural Community Inc, called on parliament to change regulations to prevent water mining in future. The permit application specified that the water would be extracted then filtered, stored in tanks and on-sold in bulk using water tankers. Carey then sought and was denied planning permission from Indigo shire council to build two storage tanks and filtration equipment on the property. “The reduction will be particularly felt by the downstream surface water users in dry years,” he said.

Source: The Guardian April 30, 2018 04:41 UTC