In the gas fields of Western Queensland, John Jenkyn motors a tinnie down the slow and silty Condamine River, turns the corner and cuts the engine.

Bubbles are erupting from the riverbed a metre under the surface. The water is bubbling with such force it looks like a spa.

"I believe it's methane coming out of the cracks in the rock," says John.

We're about 3.5km down from the Chinchilla Wier, 300km north-west of Brisbane.

John is a local landowner who's developed a real interest in what's happening in the river; he's been coming to this spot for about five years.

Gazing across the agitated surface of the water, John is convinced what we're seeing has been caused by coal seam gas (CSG) development.

"It's got to be some sort of gas," he says. "From all the people who I've talked to they say it hasn't been here before. If it's not gas escaping because of the water drawdown, it's where they're fractured through from doing the drilling."

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Whatsapp John Jenkyn.

A series of pipes run down the river bank and under the bubbles, measuring what's coming through the river. There's been plenty of research but the source of the bubbles hasn't been identified yet. In 2013, resource industry consultants Norwest Corp identified a series of possible causes - some were natural, others pointed to CSG development.

While the cause remains unclear, the CSIRO says it doesn't look like the CSG industry is to blame; the closest production fields are 5km away.

"That region has natural cracks and fissures in rocks that allow the methane to come to the surface naturally," Professor Damian Barrett, the CSIRO's lead researcher into onshore unconventional gas, told Hack.

"It's pretty unlikely that activity being undertaken in those fields is impacting directly on the fluxes of methane through the river."

'Up to 400 groundwater bores affected'

A bubbling river isn't the only environmental concern in Queensland's Western Downs, an area ringed by coal seam gas activity. There's also fears for the groundwater.

"I don't think we're in a position to say that we're at ease, that all is well... the jury is still out," Katie Lloyd tells me as we sit out the back of her place.

Katie and her husband Scott's property half-an-hour south of Chinchilla is home to a feedlot, a few crops, and about 18 coal seam gas wells.

The first was drilled more than five years ago.

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Whatsapp Katie Lloyd in front of the one 18 gas wells on her property near Chinchilla.

"It's been an interesting five years," she says. "I don't think I could say it's settled down but we're learning to live with this industry on our land."

Recently one of Katie's bores started bringing up gas instead of groundwater.

"It's a huge concern when we're so reliant on that resource for our business it is imperative for us going forward and a huge concern for the agricultural industry to continue to operate successfully."

The gas company operating on Katie's place closed off the bore. As part of 'Make Good' arrangements required under Queensland law it had to either drill the Lloyd's a new bore or offer them compensation to get the water from somewhere else. They took the cash, which for these deals is typically hundreds of thousands of dollars.

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Whatsapp A coal seam gas well near Chinchilla.

It might sound scary, but gas bubbling through groundwater bores is actually an expected impact of coal seam gas development. Some bores have been extracting water from the coal seams, as the CSIRO's Damian Barrett explained.

"It's been well known over many decades that those bores are gassy bores and that they release methane regularly along with the water," he told Hack.

Damian says at the moment about 80 bores are releasing methane now, and that figure will rise to 400 over the next 10 years.

"We're talking direct impacts over time of around 400 of 20,000 wells [across Queensland]."

'We won't know for 40 years'

Not everyone in the Western Downs is anti-CSG - there's plenty of farmers who've learnt to live with the development.

"Perfect world, sure, it would be great if there wasn't a well there, but we've devised ways around it," says Simon Druery, who fattens cattle and grows crops among about 50 CSG wells about 10kms south of Miles, near Chinchilla.

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Whatsapp Simon Druery on his property about 10km south of Miles.

As well as the wells, Simon also uses processed coal seam gas water on his crops and cattle. He had some initial reservations about doing this.

"Of course we were worried, but they have to work to a standard, and they are dear to that," he says. "They would never release water that was substandard, I can guarantee you that.

"The water we are pumping onto these crops is pretty well potable."

But an hour-and-a-half east of Simon's place, on a cotton farm just outside Dalby, Dan Hayllor still holds some reservations about the impact the gas industry is having on groundwater.

"You know, there's a lot of water coming out of the ground, so you need to be a skeptic in a way. I don't know if the science has fully proven it yet.

"We won't know for 30 or 40 years. Hopefully they got the regulation right, hopefully they got the research right, but if it is we're not going to know."