Arafura Basin Hydrogeological Inventory with Geological and Groundwater Attributes

Geoscience Australia Data compiled this inventory of descriptive attributes for the Arafura Basin, a large sedimentary basin off northern Australia. The sedimentary record spans more than 250 million years, from the late Neoproterozoic to the early Permian. It includes themes on location, geology, hydrogeology, groundwater use, and land use, with the last update recorded on 2026-04-30.

Use Cases

• Map groundwater resource potential based on described geological units like the Marchinbar Sandstone.
• Study the hydrogeological characteristics of fractured rock sandstone aquifers mentioned in the description.
• Analyze the relationship between surface water, geology, and groundwater management in a large intracratonic basin.
• Model sedimentary basin evolution using the described four main phases of regional subsidence and rock groups.

Strengths

• Covers a sedimentary record spanning more than 250 million years.
• Includes data from previous hydrogeological investigations in the 1980s and 1990s.
• Groups descriptive topics into 11 specific themes, such as Hydrogeology and Groundwater Management.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia Data

Collection Method

Compilation of descriptive attribute information associated with a spatial groundwater feature index map.

Time Range

Late Neoproterozoic to early Permian (geological time), with investigation data from the 1980s-1990s.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-30 15:18:20.557484; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Arafura Basin, northern Australia, with over 90% offshore in the Arafura Sea and onshore parts in northern Arnhem Land.