Following asmallnumberofpollutionincidents involving the death of cattle from ingestion of cyanide that had escaped from gold processing plants, the Queensland Government undertook to develop competent guidelines addressing this problem. These guidelines, "Queensland Government Guidelines on Prevention of Water Pollution from Cyanide Use in Gold Ore Processing", issued by the Department of Environment and Heritage, Department of Resource Industries and Water Resources Commission, cover hydrology and general house-keeping intended to reduce the likelihood of significant impact from a spill or unintentional dis- charge of contaminated material. There are three major advances for Queensland embodied in this Guideline:_x000D_
the use of a design approach that gives site specific standards rather than trying to give a multitude of standards broad enough to cover all situations,_x000D_
the use of hazard assessment and a "critical period" hydrologi- cal design technique, and_x000D_
new monitoring and reporting requirements._x000D_
The guideline is presented here in a summary form: