Drilling wells in the Green Adelaide region

A well construction permit gives you the approval to drill a well or undertake works on an existing well, subject to the conditions on the permit. For more information about well construction permits please see Department for Environment and Water - Well drilling permits. A water licence (or water account) gives you approval to take water from a prescribed water resource.

To lodge an application for a well construction permit, please go to mywater (login required) or contact DEW.

The EPA provides precautionary advice on domestic bore water use.  Testing your bore water regularly is an important way of checking that the groundwater quality remains suitable for its intended purpose.

The EPA website provides information about Groundwater Prohibition Areas, EPA Assessment Areas and other site contamination records, such as section 83A notifications. In these areas, contamination of groundwater is known, or suspected, to exist, so is considered unsafe to use for any purpose. A lack of records, or the absence of a GPA does not mean groundwater is safe, and contamination may still be present in an area without recorded contamination.

If your property is located within a Groundwater Prohibition Area (GPA) or in an area otherwise known or suspected as having contaminated groundwater (e.g. in an EPA assessment area), it is considered unsafe to use the groundwater for any purpose. 

For this reason, any applications for a well construction permit (including those for replacement, rehabilitation and deepening) in the shallow Quaternary aquifers within a GPA or any other area known or suspected as having contaminated groundwater will be refused in the interest of public health and safety.

Bore owners should also see the information provided by SA Health’s Water Quality Unit about the risks of using bore water and guidance on testing the water quality.

Please note that the construction of wells for geotechnical, site contamination and monitoring purposes are not subject to the process described above (e.g. these can be approved regardless of location).

Before making an application, it is recommended you visit the EPA’s website.  The EPA advises against installing wells in the Quaternary aquifers within the Green Adelaide region.  The EPA does not hold records for all areas in the Green Adelaide region. A lack of records, or the absence of a GPA, does not mean groundwater is safe, and contamination may still be present in an area without recorded contamination.

If you do lodge an application for a well construction permit and it is outside of a GPA or an area otherwise known or suspected as having contaminated groundwater, the application can be approved, (provided the application complies with the principles of the Adelaide Plains Water Allocation Plan) noting that: 

• For any permit granted in the shallow Quaternary aquifers within the Green Adelaide region, it will be a condition of your permit to have your water tested within 3 months of completing well construction, or prior to taking water (whichever comes first). See questions below for further information.
• For any permit granted in the deeper Tertiary aquifers within the Green Adelaide region, it will not be a condition of your permit to undertake testing. However, testing is still recommended in line with SA Health advice. Information on testing recommendations will be provided in the covering letter to your permit.

Please note that the construction of wells for geotechnical, site contamination and monitoring purposes do not attract conditions requiring specific testing.

The responsibility rests with the land/bore owner to have their water sampled and tested by an accredited laboratory service to ensure it is fit for purpose. This should be repeated on a regular basis; every two years is the recommended frequency. For further information please see testing requirements for private bores on the SA Health website, or section 5 below, which includes the list of water quality tests.

All testing of the water samples from a private, commercial, or community-based bore should be conducted by trained personnel and the analysis done by a National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) accredited analytical laboratory. Information about the laboratories that provide these services is outlined below.

If it is a condition of your permit to perform water testing, it is the well owner’s/ permit holder’s responsibility to investigate the costs associated with water testing. When assessing costs, keep in mind that it is strongly recommended that testing be repeated every two years.

The cost of having your water sampled and tested by a NATA-accredited laboratory (which is a mandated condition of a well permit) can be quite high, approximately $600, at a minimum. It’s strongly recommended that before drilling a well that you contact a suitably qualified laboratory to determine the costs associated with having a water sample collected and analysed. 

Based on current knowledge, there are two laboratories in South Australia that undertake both sampling and testing, in accordance with the water quality testing condition on new well permits for this area. These are:

Testing must include:

As the well permit holder, it is your responsibility to determine whether the water is ‘fit’ for your intended use. The Australian and international guidelines listed below will help you make this assessment.

SA Health is also able to assist with the interpretation of test results from a public health perspective. The SA Health Water Quality Unit can be contacted via (08) 8226 7100 or email waterquality@sa.gov.au.

Australian and international guidelines:

• Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG),
• World Health Organisation’s Guidelines for Drinking-water Quality (applicable where parameters are not listed in the ADWG (e.g. TCE)),
• Per-and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) National Environmental Management Plan (NEMP), or
• Australian and New Zealand Guidelines for Fresh and Marine Water Quality Guidelines (specifically for stock water quality values, see Volume 3 – Primary Industries – Rationale and Background Information. Please contact Biosecurity SA - Animal Health (PIRSA) for further assistance.

If the results indicate that the water is safe to use e.g. ‘fit for purpose’, then you can start using the water.

If the results indicate that there is site contamination, it is important that you immediately discontinue use. Preventing extraction of contaminated groundwater is necessary to protect human health and to prevent the spread of contamination. This can be caused by drawing water towards a property if the groundwater is being extracted from a bore.

As the owner or occupier of the site or residential property, you must notify the EPA as soon as reasonably practicable after becoming aware of the existence of contamination. This is a legal requirement under Section 83A of the Environment Protection Act 1993.  More information is available under the Frequently Asked Questions section of the EPA’s website.

The Green Adelaide region encompasses both the Central Adelaide Prescribed Wells Area and the Northern Adelaide Plains Prescribed Wells Area (PWA). 

If you wish to drill the bore for stock and domestic purposes (watering an area no greater than 0.4 ha) and the bore is located in the Central Adelaide PWA, you do not need a water licence to take groundwater. If the bore is in the Northern Adelaide Plains PWA, you do need a licence for stock and domestic purposes.

If you wish to use water for commercial/industrial or irrigation purposes in either the Central Adelaide or Northern Adelaide Plains PWA, a water licence is required. 

In order to obtain a water licence, you must make an application to transfer water entitlement or water allocation and acquire water through a water trade (water brokers may be able to assist). Applications will be assessed against the Adelaide Plains Water Allocation Plan. 

You may apply for a water licence using the forms in mywater (noting you will need to sign up / have a mywater login) or download a form at the water licence and permit forms website. For further information on water trade please see the DEW water trade website. Further information on water licenses can be found at the DEW water licenses, accounts and metering website. 

Before making an application for a well construction permit (including to replace, rehabilitate or deepen), it is recommended you visit the EPA’s website.  The EPA’s website will help you to check if the bore would be located in (or intersecting) either a GPA or EPA assessment area or if it would be close to other site contamination records. The EPA advises against installing domestic wells in the Quaternary aquifers within the Adelaide Plains region. The EPA does not hold records for all areas in the Adelaide Plains region. A lack of records, or the absence of a GPA, does not mean groundwater is safe, and contamination may still be present in an area without recorded contamination.

If you wish to check if your application would be automatically refused as it is in a GPA or EPA assessment area (thereby avoiding unnecessary payment of the application fee), refer to the EPA’s website or alternatively contact DEW’s Mount Gambier office on (08) 8735 1134.

The fee is payable for all well permit applications submitted to enable the necessary administrative purposes once the form is lodged; therefore, this is non-refundable.

The assessment process can be quite technical, depending on your location and proposed use. The standard assessment timeframe is 15 business days.

If additional assessment of your application is required, the standard processing time can be longer. For example, if a permit is requested for the construction of a well on Crown Land where Native Title may exist, processing may take more than 60 days.

A permit to construct (drill) a well expires after 12 months (i.e. the well must be drilled within that 12 months). After this time a new application will need to be submitted and paid for.

Choose a licenced driller and adhere to the conditions of your permit, whilst also having regard for the notes and advice in the communication material sent to you, including any conditions requiring water testing. This testing will need to be undertaken within 3 months of completion of the well construction, or prior to the taking of water (whichever comes first).  Refer to items 5 and 6 above.

Yes. The bore owner must undertake all testing as mandated by their permit.

Aquifers may contain chemicals and micro-organisms that are potentially harmful. Some of these chemicals are naturally occurring (such as those present in soils and rocks) while others are a result of contamination. Water quality can be quite different from bore to bore, even if they are located in close proximity.

As advised by SA Health, it is not always possible to tell if bore water is contaminated. Bore water quality may change over time. Therefore, after the initial analysis the bore water should be checked every 2 years and monitored by the owner for any undesirable changes in water quality. Where groundwater contamination becomes known in a nearby area, shallow groundwater may need to be tested more frequently. Visit the SA Health’s website to find out more.

Changes in appearance or odour can, but not always, indicate contamination. If this occurs, owners are advised to check the integrity of the bore and to test water quality. Some chemicals, such as solvents, can be odourless and colourless in groundwater.

It is important to be aware that should contamination be discovered in your area, depending on which aquifer your well is accessing, you may be advised to stop using groundwater or be legally prohibited from doing so.

No. Compensation is not provided to landholders where the EPA determines that groundwater is unsuitable for use after permits are issued. The bore owner accepts all risks and responsibility associated with obtaining a permit and construction associated with drilling the bore.

Well owners should be aware that like all industrialised cities, Adelaide has groundwater contamination as a direct result of past practices of manufacturing, industry, agriculture and burial of waste products. Investigations are ongoing and new sites of contamination are progressively being discovered.

The EPA may establish new groundwater prohibition areas where necessary and it is illegal to extract groundwater for use in these areas.

A well construction permit is valid for 12 months and is based on the knowledge available to the Minister’s delegate at that point in time.