‘Tarkine Tasmania:  wild, unique, diverse’
(A photographic essay of exploration into this unique wilderness)
Images and text courtesy of Jenny Archer and Jen Evans
Purchase book:  ^http://www.tarkineimages.com.au/purchase.html

[$5 from every copy sold will be donated to the Tarkine National Coalition – an organisation committed to protecting the Tarkine]

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The unique Tarkine

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Tasmania’s Tarkine Wilderness is one of the few remaining wild temperate rainforest regions left on the planet!

‘The Tarkine‘ is named after the Tarkiner people who traditionally inhabited the region from 30,000 years ago.  It stretches from Tasmania’s wild coastline to the west, the Arthur River to the north, the Pieman River to the south, and the Murchison Highway to the east.

The Tarkine contains remarkable natural and cultural values, including one of the world’s most significant remaining tracts of temperate rainforest.  The Tarkine covers an expansive 447,000 hectare (4,470 km²) wilderness region of recognised World Heritage significance up in the North-West corner of Tasmania, containing the largest temperate (Myrtle-Beech) rainforest in Australia.

Tasmania’ Tarkine Wilderness is indeed ‘wild, unique and diverse‘.

Myrtle Beech (Nothofagus cunninghamii)

An evergreen tree native to Victoria and Tasmania, but hardly any now left in Victoria.

Typically grow to 30–40 metres (98–130 feet) tall

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The Tarkine is the largest surviving region of Nothofagus Forest left on the planet

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The Tarkine compared internationally

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‘The Tarkine‘ is the same size as internationally well-respected national parks:

1. New Zealand’s Kahurangi National Park   (4,520 km²)
2. United States’ Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona   (4,927 km²)
3. Indonesia’s Tanjung Puting National Park in southern Borneo   (4,150 km²)
4. Scotland’s Cairngorms National Park   (4,528 km²) …per map below:

Scotland has a Tarkine wilderness equivalent – ‘Cairngorms’

.. respected as a National Park

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Rare ancient Caledonian Forest

in Cairngorms National Park, Scotland

(the same size as Tasmania’s Tarkine)

The Cairngorms National Park is special because it contains the best arctic-alpine landforms, habitats and species in Britain. This is one of the few places where wild nature is so easy to see and many of the plants and animals living here are at the extreme edges of their geographical ranges.

^http://www.cairngormslearningzone.co.uk/habitats-species.html

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Compare The Cairngorms with The Tarkine of a similar size.  The Tarkine is a relict from the ancient super-continent, Gondwanaland, characterised by highly diverse ecosystems from giant ancient forests to huge sand-dunes, sweeping beaches, rugged mountains and pristine river systems.  [Sources: ^http://tarkine.org/, ^http://www.corinna.com.au/Story/Tarkine.aspx]

The Tarkine has more than 400 species of diverse flora, including a range of native orchids and many rare and threatened species. There are more than 250 vertebrate species of fauna, 50 of which are rare, threatened and vulnerable.

These include:

• Spotted-tailed Quoll
• Tasmanian Devil
• Eastern Pygmy Possum
• Wedge-tailed Eagle
• White-breasted Sea Eagle
• Grey Goshawk (white morph)
• Giant Freshwater Lobster
• Orange-bellied Parrot   (on the brink of extinction)

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A now ‘Endangered‘ Tasmanian Devil captured on motion-sensitive camera

Walkers join forces with conservationists through Tasmania’s remote Tarkine rainforest to help bring the Tasmanian Devil back from the brink of extinction.

[Source: ‘Tourists to use cameras to help save Tasmanian Devil’  by Dominic Bates, The Guardian (UK), guardian.co.uk, 20120203, Read More:  ^http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/feb/03/tourist-cameras-save-tasmanian-devil]

(Photo courtesy of Tarkine Trails, Feb 2012)

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The Cairngorms are similarly ancient, a glacial landscape formed 40 million years before the last Ice Age.  The area also features a rare ancient woodland, the Caledonian Forest, as well as unique alpine semi-tundra moorland habitat.

The moorland provides important habitat to many rare plants, birds including Ospreys, breeding Ptarmigan, Dotterel, Snow Bunting, Golden Eagle, Ring Ouzel, and Red Grouse, with Snowy Owl, Twite, Purple Sandpiper and Lapland Bunting seen on occasion.   The Caledonian Forest supports rare birds such as the endangered Capercaillie and endemic Scottish Crossbill (found nowhere else on the planet), the Parrot Crossbill and the Crested Tit.

The Scottish Crossbill

..unique to the Cairngorms

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The Cairngorms is also home to:

• Red Deer
• Roe Deer
• Mountain Hare
• Pine Marten
• Red Squirrel
• Wild Cat
• Otter
• as well as the only herd of Reindeer in the British Isles..

Cairngorms Reindeer

Source: ^http://www.scotlandweb.be/photos.htm

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Meanwhile, The Tarkine is home to more than 130 different species of birds during the seasons throughout its variety of habitat types and landscapes. This includes eleven of Tasmania’s twelve endemic birds. The two migratory species that breed only in Tasmania, the ‘Endangered‘ Swift Parrot, and the ‘Critically Endangered‘ Orange-bellied Parrot, forage in the Tarkine.

Orange–bellied Parrot (Neophema chrysogaster)

critically dependent upon The Tarkine

In 2010 it was ranked by the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Services as one of the world’s rarest and most endangered species and “on the brink of extinction“

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Orange-bellied Parrot numbers down to about 20 individuals in existence!

Watch ABC News ^Video  (February 2012)

 

The Orange-bellied Parrot breeds in south-west Tasmania and migrates along the west coast (The Tarkine) and forages on coastal plants.  Consequently the Tarkine’s coastal vegetation is extremely important habitat. The endangered Swift Parrot breeds predominantly in south-east Tasmania and feeds on the nectar from the Tasmanian Blue Gum, and in the Tarkine, the Swift Parrot forages on these trees during the post-breeding dispersal and migration season.

The Tarkine’s bird species richness is correlated to the Tarkine’s rich habitat diversity; the sea, coastal shores, freshwater wetlands, streams and estuaries, heathland-moorland mosaic of the coastal plains, woodland and open forests, wet eucalypt forests, mixed forest and extensive rainforest.’

[Source:  Tarkine National Coalition, ^http://tarkine.org/birds/]

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National Park Protection

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The Cairngorms ecological values were recognised and protected as a National Park (NP) by the new Scottish Parliament in 2003.  [Read More:  ^www.cairngormscampaign.org]

But unlike the Cairngorms NP, Kahurangi NP, Grand Canyon NP and Tanjung Puting NP, just less than 5% of The Tarkine is protected as a National Park.   Within the Tarkine region’s 4,470 km2, recognised as bounded by the coast to the west, the Arthur River to the north, the Pieman River to the south, and the Murchison Highway to the east, only Savage River National Park  (180km2) , less than 5% of The Tarkine, provides any formal ecological protection.

The ‘Donaldson River Nature Recreational Reserve’, the ‘Meredith Range Recreational Reserve’ and the Arthur Pieman Conservation Area within The Tarkine offer no formal ecological protection and are open to mechanised recreational abuse.  See map below.  Propaganda by vested interests would have many believe that these reserves offer sufficient ecological protection, but such reserves permit multiple uses – motorised vehicular access including off-road, as well as road making, logging, burning,  mining, poaching of wildlife, fishing, farming and tourism development – so effectively offering no ecological protection.

[Read the propaganda in The (Launceston) Examiner newspaper:  ‘Mining heritage’, 20110320, ^http://www.examiner.com.au/news/local/news/environment/mining-heritage/2108235.aspx?storypage=0].  The Examiner threatened: “If successful the campaign of the Tarkine National Coalition will perpetrate an injustice on local people leading to negative impacts on both the Tasmanian economy and the quality of life of its people.”

What scaremongering crock!  But then who are the readership and who are the sources of advertising revenue of The Examiner?

 

The Tarkine of North-West Tasmania

Note:  dotted boundary above is only indicative

(Google Maps)

For a more detailed map of the proposed Tarkine National Park, click here)

[Source: ^http://development.savethetarkine.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/topo_tarkine_boundary.jpg]

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Savage River National Park  

(inside The Tarkine)

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Savage River National Park is described by the Tasmanian Government’s Parks and Wildlife Service as follows:

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‘Savage River National Park is a wilderness region in the north west of Tasmania. The park protects the largest contiguous area of cool temperate rainforest surviving in Australia and acts as a refuge for a rich primitive flora, undisturbed river catchments, high quality wilderness, old growth forests, geodiversity and natural landscape values.

The western portion of the park includes the most extensive basalt plateaux in Tasmania that still retains a wholly intact forest ecosystem. The upper Savage River, which lends the park its name, runs through a pristine, rainforested river gorge system. The park contains habitat for a diverse rainforest fauna and is a stronghold for a number of vertebrate species which have suffered population declines elsewhere in Tasmania and mainland Australia.

The parks remoteness from human settlement and mechanised access, its undisturbed hinterland rivers and extensive rainforest, pristine blanket bog peat soils and isolated, elevated buttongrass moorlands ensure the wilderness character of the park. Like the vast World Heritage listed Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area to its south, the area is one of the few remaining temperate wilderness areas left on Earth.

Unlike other national parks, Savage River National Park remains inaccessible. In keeping with its wilderness character, there are no facilities and no roads or mechanised access to the park. However, the park is surrounded by the Savage River Regional Reserve, in which a number of rough 4WD tracks provide limited access. To the north of the reserve, a number of State Forest Reserves can be accessed by standard vehicles. They offer an insight into the magnificent rainforest ecosystem that lies to the southeast within the Savage River National Park.’

[Source: Parks and Wildlife Service, Tasmania, ^http://www.parks.tas.gov.au/index.aspx?base=3732]

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 But the above description is only a tiny snapshot of The Tarkine

The Tarkine still is undoubtedly one of the World’s great wild places

Giant Eucalyptus regnans of   The Tarkine

(click image to enlarge)

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The Tarkine’s World Heritage significance

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The Tarkine is a region of recognised World Heritage significance. It’s wilderness, vast rainforests, wildlife, landscapes and unique Aboriginal values are outstanding on a world scale.

However, the Tarkine is not protected as a National Park nor listed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.  Only a fraction, less than 5%, of the Tarkine region is fully protected as a National Park.  This means that many of the Tarkine’s outstanding natural and cultural values, are in dire peril due to repeated exploitation demands from industrial logging and more recently industrial mining.

These industrial threats mean that The Tarkine ecology could be lost forever!

Logging legacy in The Tarkine

 

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Attempts have been made to have The Tarkine listed not only as a National Park, but also as a World Heritage Listed Area.

Local conservation champions of The Tarkine, the Tarkine National Coalition (TNC) have produced an extensive proposal that would protect the Tarkine and its unique values as a National Park and World Heritage area, for all people, for all time, just like Kakadu NP and Cairngorms NP.

Read More:

• >Tarkine World Heritage Values Summary
  

• >Tarkine World Heritage Values  Map
  

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[Source: Australian Government, ^http://www.environment.gov.au/heritage/ahc/national-assessments/tarkine/pubs/tarkine-values-summary-2011.pdf]

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The Tarkine would become recognised as one of Australia’s great iconic wild places, allowing locals, visitors, walkers, photographers, scientists, the Aboriginal community and tourists alike to see, visit and experience this unique place.

A number of prominent bodies have recognised the World Heritage significance of the Tarkine:

• The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (1990)
• The Tasmanian Department of Parks, Wildlife & Heritage (1990)
• The Australian government recognised the Tarkine’s outstanding national significance through listing the Tarkine on the register of the National Estate Leading Tasmanian & Australian environment groups (including The Wilderness Society and the Australian Conservation Foundation, amongst a wide range of others)
• The Australian Senate formally and unanimously recognised the World Heritage significance of the Tarkine (2007).

For the Tarkine to be inscribed on the World Heritage list, it would need to be formally put forward to UNESCO (the United Nations Body) by the Australian Government.  Yet, there has been a failure by successive Environment Minister’s to instruct the Australian Heritage Council to commence assessment of the World Heritage values contained within the Tarkine.

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[Source: ^http://tarkine.org/national-park-and-world-heritage-aspirations/]

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The natural ecological wealth of Tasmania’s Tarkine Wilderness

(Arthur River rainforest, Photo by Ted Mead)

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On 11 December 2009, Australia’s Environment Minister (then Peter Garrett MP) entered The Tarkine in Australia’s National Heritage List under the emergency listing provisions of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. This emergency listing lapsed in December 2010.

The Australian Heritage Council has since completed a preliminary assessment of The Tarkine and found that The Tarkine might have one or more National Heritage values.  It is now up to Australia’s Environment Minister (currently Tony Burke MP) to decide whether The Tarkine, or areas within it, should be listed of Australia’s National Heritage List.   So, the fate of this magnificent wild region, effectively Australia’s Amazon, rests with one man, Tony Burke MP.

[Source: Australian Government, ^http://www.environment.gov.au/heritage/ahc/national-assessments/tarkine/information.html]

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Tarkine Threatened by Industrial Miners

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Despite The Tarkine’s many unique ecological values, there are some who chose to ignore and dismiss The Tarkine for their own self-serving gain.  Industrial Miners are seeking to plunder The Tarkine for minerals below ground.  If these miners get their way, they will open cut The Tarkine and irreversibly destroy it.   The Tarkine’s natural future as a wild region and its dependent wildlife hang in the balance.

Currently limited mining occurs within parts of the Tarkine.  The most significant mining operations within the Tarkine region is the Savage River Iron Ore Mine, which is currently managed by Grange Resources, and the Hellyer Mine managed by Bass Metals.

Savage River Iron Ore Mine

..in the Tarkine

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Hellyer Zinc and Lead Mine

..in the Tarkine

Construction of a new underground mine at the Fossey deposit, near Hellyer, began in January 2010.
[Source:  Mineral Resources Council (Tas Govt)

^http://www.mrt.tas.gov.au/portal/page?_pageid=35,831239&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL

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Now there are another 10 new mines proposed to destroy The Tarkine!

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Tasmanian Government’s mining leases (Dec, 2012)

threaten to destroy most of The Tarkine

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Nine of the planned ten mines are nearby Savage River ‘open-cut’ style mines.  The Tasmanian Government under the watch of Labor’s Bryan Green MP has overseen its Tasmanian Mineral Council grant some 56 exploration licences over the Tarkine to 27 different industrial mining companies.

Savage River Mine location map

..already in The Tarkine

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Savage River Open Cut Mine

..a harbinger for The Tarkine… landscape absolute anhiliation

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Savage River – a savage scar in The Tarkine

..courtesy of industrial miner Grange Resources

(Google Earth – click image to enlarge)

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Venture Minerals‘ proposed Tin Mine at Mount Lindsay (2011)

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West Australian headquartered Venture Minerals has submitted mining permits to the Tasmanian Government to allow it to develop a tin/tungsten open cut mine at Mount Lindsay, so it can sell Tasmanian resource wealth to China.  It will extend over 36,000 hectares (360 km2), creating a permanent scar through The Tarkine, roughly an area the size of the Tamar Valley from Launceston to Georgetown.

Mount Lindsay Tin Mine Plans (Venture Minerals)

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“The Mount Lindsay mine is a Pilbara style open cut super pit that will devastate a large area of the Tarkine rainforest wilderness within an existing reserve. The 3.5 x 3km disturbance area is the equivalent of 420 Melbourne Cricket Grounds and a 220m depth being over twice the height of the Sydney Harbour Bridge,” said Tarkine National Coalition spokesperson Scott Jordan.

“It is completely inconsistent with the protection of the Tarkine, and Minister Burke must act immediately to ensure that the Tarkine has the highest level of protection going into this assessment.”

[Source:  ‘Mine plan prompts new Emergency National Heritage bid for Tarkine’, by Scott Jordan, Campaign Coordinator Tarkine National Coalition, 20111111, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php/article/mine-plan-prompts-new-emergency-national-heritage-bid-for-tarkine]

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Venture Minerals plans to rely on Tasmanian hydro power (probably at a government subsidised discount and so further reducing the power available to Tasmanian residents).   Tasmania’s precious natural heritage is pillaged to make West Australian and foreign corporate investors richer.

[Read More: ^http://www.ventureminerals.com.au/projects_tas.html].

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Shree Minerals proposed open-cut mine at Nelson Bay River (2011)

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Shree Minerals wants an open cut mine on the upper reaches of Nelson Bay River.   According to the Tasmanian Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), Shree Minerals Ltd has proposed to develop an open pit magnetitie/hematite mine and processing plant near Nelson Bay River, approximatley 7 kilometres east of Temma in northwest Tasmania. The proposed mine will target 4 million tonnes of the resource over a 10 year period producing 150,000 tonnes of product per year.

[Source: Tasmanian EPA, ^http://epa.tas.gov.au/regulation/shree-minerals-ltd-nelson-bay-river-mine   [>Read More (PDF, 7MB)]

.Shree Minerals proposed Tin Mine Near Nelson Bay River

..in The Tarkine

(click map to enlarge)

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Shree Minerals is an Indian company based in Madhya Pradesh in central India [Read More:  ^http://www.shreemineralsandfuels.com/]  So Tasmania’s precious natural heritage is pillaged to make Indian billionaires richer.

It has found to give scant regard to protecting fragile ecology in The Tarkine.   Shree Minerals’ Environmental Impact Statement for the proposed Nelson Bay River open cut iron ore mine as a mismatch of omissions, flawed assumptions and misrepresentations, according to the Tarkine National Coalition.

• Key data on endangered orchids is missing
• Projections on impacts on Tasmanian devil and Spotted tailed quoll are based on flawed and fanciful data
• The EIS produced by the company as part of the Commonwealth environmental assessments has failed to produce a report relating to endangered and critically endangered orchid populations in the vicinity of the proposed open cut mine. The soil borne Mychorizza fungus is highly succeptible to changes in hydrology, and is essential to the germination of the area’s native orchids which cannot exist without Mychorizza. Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke included this report as a requirement in the project’s EIS guidelines issued in June 2011.
• Shree Minerals have avoided producing scientific claiming that its proposed 220 metre deep hole extending 1km long will have no impact on hydrologyor on cthe adjacent Nelson Bay River.
• Data relating to projections of Tasmanian devil roadkill from mine related traffic are flawed. The company has used a January-February traffic surveys as a current traffic baseline which skews the data due to the higher level of tourist, campers and shackowner during the traditional summer holiday season. DIER data indicates that there is a doubling of vehicles on these road sections between October and January.   The company also asserted an assumed level of mine related traffic that is substantially lower than their own expert produced Traffic Impact Assessment. The roadkill assumptions were made on an additional 82 vehicles per day in year one, and 34 vehicles per day in years 2-10, while the figures the Traffic Impact Assessment specify 122 vehicles per day in year one, and 89 vehicles per day in ongoing years.“When you apply the expert Traffic Impact Assessment data and the DIER’s data for current road use, the increase in traffic is 329% in year one and 240% in years 2-10 which contradicts the company’s flawed projections of 89% and 34%”.   “This increase of traffic will, on the company’s formulae, result in up to 32 devil deaths per year, not the 3 per year in presented in the EIS.”

 

“Shree Minerals either is too incompetent to understand it’s own expert reports, or they have set out to deliberately mislead the Commonwealth and State environmental assessors.”

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[Source:  ‘Shree Minerals’ Impact Statement documentation critically non-compliant’, by Scott Jordan, Campaign Coordinator Tarkine National Coalition, 20120222, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php/article/shree-minerals-impact-statement-documentation-critically-non-compliant]

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Nelson Bay River flows through pristine wilderness

Industrial Miners just don’t get it!

[Source: http://www.dpiw.tas.gov.au  (Nelson Bay Report on water quality monitoring – >Read Report]

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In 2011, a visit to the Shree Minerals’ Nelson Bay River proposed mine site in the Arthur Pieman Conservation Area has discovered that the mining company has failed to cap at least nine drill holes, creating risks to the resident population of disease free Tasmanian devils.

Failing to cap drill holes is a serious breach of both the Mineral Exploration Code of Practice and the operating conditions of their Exploration License. If Tasmanian devils are found to have perished in the holes, the company may be in breach of the Threatened Species Protection Act 1995.

Shree Minerals death traps for Tasmanian Devils

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[Source: ‘Call for Moratorium on New Mines in Tasmania. ‘Shree’s deception makes them unfit’’, by Isla MacGregor, Tasmanian Public & Environmental Health Network (TPEHN), 20110930, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php/article/call-for-moratorium-on-new-mines-in-tasmania]

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Ecological damage from ‘Mineral Exploration’

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Shree Minerals carving up wilderness across The Tarkine, even before mining commences

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Even before actual mining commences, mineral exploration causes its own destructive impacts upon fragile ecosystems:

1. New access roads are bulldozed through pristine wilderness to multiple exploration and drilling sites.
2. Native vegetation and dependent ecology is destroyed as gridlines are bulldozed
3. Fragile top soils are removed
4. Soil erosion occurs at drills sites as soon as it rains, and rainfall is particularly intense across western Tasmania
5. The eroded soil becomes sediment and chokes and pollutes nearby watercourses and further downstream
6. Exposed soils also erode into watercourses, and without topsoil the native vegetation is unable to recover
7. Rubbish is dumped
8. Spills of chemicals and pollutants from drilling contaminate crystal pure watercourses and permeate into ground water and aquifers
9. Spread of pests including plant diseases such as myrtle wilt is exacerbated
10. Drill holes into ground water disturb and alter aquifers causing unknown impacts particularly in karst areas, which are prevalent across The Tarkine

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These impacts are ignored by industrial miners.

Industrial Miners eco-raping the fragile Tarkine

Wam, bam thank you mam!

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Tasmania’s Minerals Council – one eyed to pillage

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The Tasmanian Minerals Council exists so that Tasmania may be mined.  Irrespective of what values are on the surface, the Tasmanian Minerals Council sees Tasmania as a quarry to be exploited.  If it is not mining Tasmania, or talking about current and planned mines, or encouraging more mining of Tasmania, then it simply isn’t doing its job putting its very existence into question.  Its mandate is one eyed.

Just as Forestry Tasmania is the industry driver of logging of Tasmania’s native forests, the Tasmanian Minerals Council is the industry driver of mining Tasmania’s native forests – same destructive outcome, just different type of industrial exploitation.  Both are tacit Tasmanian government departments only with corporatised names and structures.   See a map of Tasmania through the eyes of the Tasmanian Minerals Council below:

Quarry Map of Tasmania

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Tasmanian Minerals Council describes itself as “the representative organisation for the exploration, mining and mineral processing industries in Tasmania“.  It counts among its members all of the main mines and mineral processing operations.   So basically it is the Tasmanian Government’s Department of Mining, but named a ‘council‘ in order to convey a public impression of being an industry body, whereas it is just a policy arm of government.

And the board of directors are all executives employed by industrial miners.  They each have vested interests in mining Tasmania for their own company benefits, and collectively to maximise the exploitation of Tasmania for mining.  It is cosy chronyism, and accountable to the broader Tasmanian community.

Terry Long

Tasmanian Minerals Council current CEO

Capable of seeing Tasmania only through miner’s subterranean eyes

“You wouldn’t want to contemplate a Northern Tasmania economy without Temco (an industrial manganese-alloy smelter operation) and Bell Bay Aluminium”

~ Terry Long, 17th March 2012.

[Source: ‘Mining challenges are revealed at forum‘, by Brianna McShane, 20120317, ^http://www.examiner.com.au/news/local/news/general/mining-challenges-are-revealed-at-forum/2491279.aspx]

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To justify its existence the Tasmanian Minerals Council thinks it and mining Tasmania is very important.

“The minerals industry is the cornerstone of Tasmania’s economy. It is important to the lives of every Tasmanian and brings with it a rich economic and cultural heritage and a capacity to ensure a prosperous future for Tasmania.”

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The Tasmanian Labor Party (currently in government)  and the Tasmanian Liberal Party both see mining as important to Tasmania because of the mining royalty revenue derived by the Tasmanian Government.  Of course it is about money.

To be politically correct, the Tasmanian Minerals Council professes a catchphrase:  “promoting the development of safe, profitable and sustainable mineral sector operating within Tasmania“.  It may be sustainable, but sustainable for industrial miners, not Tasmania’s ecology.

It sees itself playing a role in developing the world’s natural resources to supply the demands of modern society, by digging up more of Tasmania.  It says that it recognises modern societal expectations of good environmental management and claims that it is ensuring environmental impacts are minimised.  It promises that ongoing problems from old mining operations in Tasmania will be rectified if possible.  It talks about following a ‘Code for Environmental Management‘ and about observing a set of principles and encourages continual improvement for environmental performance, and indeed broadened the Code to encompass goals and actions that are more representative of a sustainable development framework.

Wonderful motherhood stuff, except the mining reality across Tasmania is completely different.

2011:  Sludge from the Aberfoyle Mine runs into the river at Luina (Savage River National Park)

..in The  Tarkine

(Photo by Peter Sims, Fairfax)

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Tasmania’s infamous Iron Blow Mine

Queenstown’s moonscape legacy of Mount Lyell copper mining

(Photo February 2010 – hardly rehabilitated]

[Source: ^http://www.sauer-thompson.com/junkforcode/archives/2010/02/]

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Queenstown’s sulphuric acid legacy of copper mining

..no plans to rehabilitate the moonscape.

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The confluence of the King River and Queen River, a few years ago.

Orange-coloured heavy metal toxins from Queenstown and Mt Lyell copper mining continue to flow into Macquarie Harbour.

No effort is made by the Tasmanian Minerals Council to rehabilitate these wild rivers.

Says the Council:  “It was established well before the understandings and knowledge we have now, and the practice we expect today. The legacy from the old surface workings will be carried for a long time..”

And this council want more mines in The Tarkine?

 

‘Past damage caused from mining around Queenstown was a product of its times, although present and future generations live with its legacy. Historical practice is not modern practice. Mt Lyell Mine’s holocaust landscape legacy is testament to a past that did not have the technological knowledge or environmental vision we have today. The economic imperative was the main consideration.’

[Source:  A mining propaganda brochure produced by The Tasmanian Mineral Council in 2004 entitled ‘Wilderness, Rivers and Mines – The West Coast Experience‘, ^http://www.tasminerals.com.au/west-coast.pdf]

What has changed?   Nothing.

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Tasmanian Minerals Council – ‘Group-Serving Bias’ Syndrome

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Head in the ground, the Tasmanian Minerals Council is functionally fixed on the view that Tasmania exists so that it man be mined for profit.

The Tasmanian Minerals Council and its mining fraternity suffer from Group-Serving Bias – the tendency to evaluate ambiguous information in a way beneficial to the interests of miners, while auto-dismissing conservationists’ ecological concerns.  They see themselves as unaccountable to the Tasmanian public – only to the government and mining vested interests.

The plethora of evidence showing the mining industries destructive impacts on the natural landscape and irreversible harm caused to wildlife and its habitat are ignored by industrial miners and the Tasmanian Minerals Council.  The devastating moonscape and dead river legacies of mining across Tasmania are conveniently dismissed by the Tasmanian Minerals Council as ‘history’.

Those careered into the exploitative cultures of Industrial Logging and Industrial Mining, ignorant of Ecology, fail to respect vital and rare natural values even when immersed in a pristine and rare region like The Tarkine.

Why?

Industrialists during their working lives culturally learn a perception bias to dismiss Nature not as integrated Natural Assets, but as untapped Resources waiting to be exploited and profited for industrial gain.

This is an Industrial World View that emanated out of the Industrial Revolution in early 18th Century Britain.  Industrialism has become synonymous with Human Progress and has exponentially grown into what has become known as 20th Century global multinational industrialism.   Multinational Industrialism is all about large scale efficient exploitation of resources – Natural or Human in order to maximise self-serving interests.  On a local level, this translates into exploitation.  The Industrial World View is locally destructive, selfish, arrogant and short-sighted.  The Tasmanian Minerals Council continues as a legacy of that time..

 

Scott Jordan of Tarkine National Coalition at the so-called “rehabilitated” tailings dam at a tin mine in The Tarkine.

.. would mining executives drink this brown toxic, acidic, heavy metal water?

This is the Tasmanian Mineral Council being ‘sustainable‘ – they just don’t get it!

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Tasmanian Mineral Council’s public image spin-doctoring claims that the Tasmanian mining industry did not have a good history when it came to good environmental management. Environmental awareness began to rise around the world in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Until then, the environmental performance of both industry and individuals was often poor, when measured against today’s standards.

Crap!

The Tasmanian Minerals Council does not recognise The Tarkine.  Instead, it sees the west coast of Tasmania being “world famous for its geology and mineralisation and world class mineral deposits lie in an arc of volcanic lavas from Low Rocky Point in Tasmania’s South West, northwards through the great mining areas of Mt Lyell, the Dundas mineral field, Henty, Zeehan mineral field, Renison Bell, Rosebery, Tullah, Que River and Hellyer then eastwards to the Moina mineral field near SheffieldSuper…”

What Tarkine?  What forests, where?

This year, the Tasmanian Minerals Council encouraged by the Labor Party’s pro-industrialist, Bryan Green MP, is ramping up mining activity, particularly in The Tarkine.  Bryan Green is currently Tasmania’s Deputy Premier and Minister for Primary Industries, Water, Energy, Resources, Local Government, Planning, and Racing.

Bryan Green MP

Tasmania’s current Labor Minister for Resources and Energy, etc

Caught drink driving in June 2011

[Source: ^http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2011/06/26/240875_tasmania-news.html]

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Bryan Green and Tasmanian Minerals Council are in a froth at present with ‘almost 80 companies spending a record $38.7 million last year looking for the mines of tomorrow’.  Drill rigs are humming on many of the 194 exploration licences held by these companies and another 15 licences are pending approval’ – reports the Hobart Mercury newspaper.

Spending on exploration has now rebounded to above pre-global financial crisis levels and several projects have progressed to the point where new mining jobs are on the horizon.

Mining hopefuls are shoring up iron and tin deposits on the West Coast, while others are looking deeper into coal proposals at Fingal and silica projects at Maydena.

Venture Minerals is progressing its iron and iron, tungsten and tin mine at Mount Lindsay outside Burnie and Shree Minerals is working to get its iron ore mine running at Nelson Bay River, in the Tarkine.

Shree Minerals is one of about 20 companies with their eyes set firmly on the mining potential in the Tarkine, as conservationists are working to have the area protected through a Natural Heritage listing. Ultimately, green groups want the area to become a national park, which would stop mining development in its tracks.

At Zeehan, Melbourne-based company Stellar Resources is spending $6 million on a year-long drilling program as it progresses its plans to construct a $108-million tin mine and processing plant.

Stellar Resources chief executive Peter Blight said the company hoped to move into construction in 2014 and start producing tin concentrate in 2015.  He said the company was excited by its Heemskirk Tin project which it took on as a solo venture last year.

The area has been investigated for its mineral potential before first by the West Coast’s mining pioneers and more recently by Aberfoyle. When Western Metals took over Aberfoyle, the Zeehan tin project sat in the bottom of a drawer.

But Mr Blight said early drilling and scoping studies looked promising and he expected to be working on financing the project by the end of next year.

Demand for tin continues to increase as the world shuns lead solder.  Right now, there is a 70,000-tonne gap between global tin demand and supply.

When developed, the Heemskirk project would produce almost 4000 tonnes of tin concentrate a year and be only the second tin mine in Australia.

The other, Renison Bell, is just 18km away from Zeehan.’

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[Source:  ‘Drill rigs hum in $38m hunt‘, by Helen Kempton, The Mercury (Hobart), 20120416, ^http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2012/04/16/319021_tasmania-news.html]

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Now Industrial Miners are set to exterminate The Tarkine!

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When Coal Seam Gas fracking contaminates underground aquifers

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Since 2008,  Anna Bligh’s Queensland Labor Government has encouraged and welcomed the establishment of Coal Seam Gas (CSG) across Queensland with open arms…

“The Queensland Government welcomes the establishment of a new energy industry, which diversifies our State’s fuel mix and capitalises on our state’s extensive coal seam gas (CSG) reserves to meet the growing global demand for liquefied natural gas (LNG).   The LNG industry provides Queensland with an exciting opportunity to create new jobs in our regional centres, affected by the recent downturn in resource exports, and increases the potential prosperity of all Queenslanders through greater export revenue and royalty payments.”

[Source: ^http://www.industry.qld.gov.au/documents/LNG/Blueprint_for_Queenslands_LNG_Industry.pdf   [>Read LNG Blueprint]

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Coal Seal Gas mining permeating across Queensland food bowl

and taking water from our precious Artesian Basin

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Geoscience Australia:  

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‘Coal Seam Gas (CSG) is a naturally occurring methane gas found in most coal seams and is similar to conventional natural gas. In Australia the commercial production of CSG commenced in 1996 in the Bowen Basin, Queensland. Since then production has increased rapidly, particularly during the first decade of the 21st century. CSG has now become an integral part of the gas industry in eastern Australia, particularly in Queensland.

Information about reserves of CSG has grown significantly, particularly in the Bowen and Surat basins in Queensland. In New South Wales reserves have been proven in the Sydney, Gunnedah, Clarence-Moreton and Gloucester basins. Exploration has been undertaken or is planned to be undertaken in other coal basins including the Galilee, Arckaringa, Perth and Pedirka basins.

A major driver for the growth in CSG was a decision in 2000 by the Queensland Government that required 13% of all power supplied to the state electricity grid to be generated by gas by 2005. That requirement has been increased to 15% by 2010 and 18% by 2020.

CSG reserves have grown to such an extent that a number of Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) plants have been proposed based on exports from Gladstone, Queensland.’

[Source: Geoscience Australia, ^http://www.ga.gov.au/energy/petroleum-resources/coal-seam-gas.html]

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The grossly financial wasteful Labor Government in Queensland has become so desperate for new revenue that the promised millions in CGS royalties from this new LNG industry is tantalisingly irresistable to the extent that Queensland farms and environment have become deliberately ignored and railroaded by the Bligh Labor Government.

Bligh’s Labor Government has wasted:

• $2 billion on the Toowoomba water recycling plant, now a white elephant
• $1.1 billion on another rusting desalination plant at Tugun
• $600 million on the failed Traveston Dam plan
• $450 million on the Traveston Crossing plan
• $350 million on Wyaralong Dam, not even connected to the grid
• $283.5 million on the health payroill debacle
• $112 million on Smart Card drivers licenses that aren’t smart
• $7 million a month in government advertising
• $450,000 rental bill for an empty State Government office in Los Angeles

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[Ed:  This is criminally negligent misappropriation of the entrusted Queensland Treasury]

[Source:  ^http://www.stoplaborwaste.com/]

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Goodna Sewage Pump Station (outer Brisbane)

designed to convert to drinking water to Toowoomba

..except Toowoomba residents won’t take city shit

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So with $5 billion in Queenslander taxes squandered by Queensland Labor, no wonder the Bligh Labor Government has been so desperate for the lure of mining royalties.. at any cost including jeopardising the prime agricultural land of the Darling Downs.

The development of energy resources in the Surat Basin (Darling Downs and South West Queensland region) and associated LNG projects in the Gladstone (Fitzroy and Central West Queensland) region is set provide annual royalty returns of over $850 million to the Bligh Labor Government.  Bligh is more than happy to send in the corporate miners to undermine the food bowl of Queenslanders and pollute their drinking water by fracking in the process.

As the above LNG Blueprint disloses above, it is all about ” greater export revenue and royalty payments.”…at any cost – social, heritage, environmental.  Queensland Labor Premier Anna Bligh has prrepared to take on the Federal Government over any increase to red tape from its new oversight of the coal seam gas industry.

[Source: ‘Queensland Premier Anna Bligh offers coal seam gas industry help on red tape’, by John McCarthy, The Courier-Mail, 20111123, ^http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/bligh-offers-csg-help/story-e6freon6-1226203063565]

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Bligh – new CSG cash royalties

.. fracking Queensland in the process

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Federal Labor’s Environment Minister Tony Mr Burke has said that Queensland farmers are safeguarded by federal regulations that went much further than those of Queensland.

But in November 2011, confidential advice obtained by The Australian newspaper under Freedom of Information laws, shows that Tony Burke has known about coal-seam gas developments in southern Queensland have serious uncertainties about the impact on groundwater and salinity.

The documents include departmental briefings for Mr Burke’s decision to approve the APLNG project, a joint venture between Origin and Conoco Phillips that involves 10,000 production wells and more than 10,000km of access roads and pipelines.

It is the biggest CSG project ever approved in Australia.

Tara (west of Dalby), south east Queensland

Coal Seam Gas pipelines now dominate the rural landscape

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On the groundwater impact, the advice says Geoscience Australia warned of “high levels of uncertainty in the predicted impacts of CSG developments on groundwater behaviour and on EPBC (Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act) listed ecological communities”. It says that Geoscience Australia believed that “APLNG’s modelling requires further work to fully establish uncertainties”.

The advice to Mr Burke provided in February recommended he approve the $35 billion project because he had approved two smaller projects. This indicates the department has ignored the cumulative effects of these projects on groundwater and water use.

[Read More: ‘Tony Burke warned of ‘uncertain’ gas impact on groundwater‘, by Paul Cleary, The Australian, 20111107, ^http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/burke-warned-of-uncertain-gas-impact/story-fn59niix-1226187080366]

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Bligh’s Labor Mates in Canberra

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14th March, 2012:

‘Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke (Ed: Labor Party) has removed a possible electoral problem for the Bligh government in Queensland by delaying environmental approval for the massive expansion of the Abbot Point coal terminal in north Queensland until well after the election.

The Queensland government plans to expand Abbot Point, near Bowen and directly beside the Great Barrier Reef, from its current capacity of 50 million tonnes of coal a year to 400 million tonnes, but the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the expansion needs to be approved by the federal government first.  The EIS was lodged in December and there is a statutory requirement for the federal minister to respond within 40 working days.

Last week, Mr Burke quietly slipped through an extension of the timeframe until the end of this year, although a hand-written note on the briefing paper written by him states that “I note the decision may still be made earlier than the extended deadline”.

The expansion of Abbot Point is particularly sensitive as the port is right beside the Great Barrier Reef.  It is designed to cater for the new coalmining area in the Galilee Basin.

Concerns about possible damage to the reef through a build-up of coal ships passing through the reef have been highlighted in recent days by a visit from UNESCO officers.

Mr Burke’s decision will delay the construction of 12 coal-loading berths at the terminal that have been allocated to six companies, including Waratah Coal, owned by billionaire Clive Palmer.’
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[Read More: ‘Sensitive Reef coal port decision off agenda‘, by Andrew Fraser, The Australian, 20120314, ^http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/elections/sensitive-reef-coal-port-decision-off-agenda/story-fnbsqt8f-1226298622984]

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Coal Seam Gas kills American cattle

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Meanwhile, exposure to coal seam gas drilling operations in the United States has been strongly linked to serious health problems in humans, pets, livestock and other animals, a new US study has found.  Australian environmentalists say the study shows the need for caution in opening the country up to coal seam gas extraction.

University of Massachusetts researchers interviewed 24 US farmers affected by shale gas drilling and found the practice was “strongly implicated” in serious health problems in humans and animals.   In one case, 17 cows died in one hour from respiratory failure after shale gas fracking fluids were accidentally released into an adjacent paddock.

Fracking refers to the controversial method of injecting chemicals, water and sand at high pressures to crack rock and release gas.

On another farm, 70 of 140 cattle exposed to wastewater from fracking died, as did a number of cats and dogs from a neighbourhood where wastewater was spread on roads as a method of disposal.

The study also cites a case in which a child was hospitalised with arsenic poisoning soon after drilling and fracking began near their home.  Occupants of another home near gas wells suffered headaches, nosebleeds and rashes, and their hearing and sense of smell was affected.

The study’s authors recommend more research into the effects of shale gas extraction in the US, or a total ban on the practice.

NSW Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham says the study shows the need for caution in the expansion of CSG mining in the state.

“Many of the methods, chemicals and techniques used in US conventional and unconventional gas extraction are the same as those used in Australia with coal seam gas,” he said in a statement.

The National Toxics Network called on Australia’s state governments to conduct a full assessment of the impacts of CSG on animals living close to gas wells.
“We know so little about the long term impacts on the health of wildlife and farm animals of this industry,” the network’s senior adviser Mariann Lloyd-Smith said in a statement.

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[Source:  ‘Study warns of CSG health risks‘, AAP, The West Australian, 20120110,^http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/business/a/-/business/12542344/study-warns-of-csg-health-risks/]

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‘Centralia’, Pennsylvania (USA) and its 1000 residents the victims of a coal seam mine fire in 1962,which has been burning under the area ever since.

The entire town was condemned in 1992 and only a few stragglers are left behind.

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Coal Seam Gas poisons cattle in Pennsylvania

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‘Stillborn and deformed cows, ponds that turned black and poisoned drinking water.  Those are some of the little-reported effects being visited on Pennsylvania in the rush to tap natural gas from the Marcellus Shale, two angry Washington County farmers told about 100 people at a forum in Lancaster city Sunday afternoon.

“This has been nothing but hell for my family and neighbors,” said Ron Gulla, whose farm near Hickory was the second Marcellus Shale well drilled in the state….’

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[Read More: ‘2 farmers assail gas drillers at forum‘, 20110515, LancasterOnline.com, ^http://coalseamgasnews.org/2011/2-farmers-assail-gas-drillers-at-forum/]

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Back in Queensland, on 30th May 2011, Labor Prime Minister Julia Gillard, and Queensland Labor Premier Anna Bligh unveil the coal seam gas expansion plant at Curtis Island

‘New Gas Age’ for Queensland – enthusiastically opened by Bligh

Goodbye beautiful innocent Gladstone

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‘Premier Anna Bligh and Prime Minister Julia Gillard herald the ‘new gas age’ as a liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage plant opens Curtis Island off Gladstone in central Qld.’

[Watch ABC Video: ‘Gillard, Bligh unveil coal seam gas expansion‘, ABC TV, ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-05-27/gillard-bligh-unveil-coal-seam-gas-expansion/2734636]

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Three months later in August 2011, Bligh’s Queensland Government was forced to investige traces of cancer-causing Benzene, toluene and xylene at Arrow Energy’s 14 CSG bores at Tipton West and Daandine gas fields near Dalby.

Benzene, toluene, ethylene and xylene (commonly known as BTEX) were outlawed last October in Queensland for use in fracking, a process used in the CSG industry to split rock seams and extract methane.

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[Source: ‘Carcinogens found in water at coal seam gas site‘, by Kym Agius, 20110829, ^http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/carcinogens-found-in-water-at-coal-seam-gas-site-20110829-1jgxb.html]

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Queensland Conservation Community (QCC) on Coal Seam Gas

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Expansion of the QLD Coal Seam Gas (CSG) industry has been occurring at a very rapid rate over recent years.

While the CSG industry is bringing wealth and jobs to areas like the Surat Basin, the immediate and longterm environmental impacts potentially caused by the industry are largely unmeasured and unchecked. This is mainly due to the rapid growth of the industry outstripping legislative and regulatory frameworks, resulting in an imbalance between the CSG industries, primary production and protecting the environment.

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Key issues

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The key environmental issues that QCC is concerned about include:

• Impacts to over and under lying aquifers
• Extraction of substantial volumes of groundwater as part of the CSG extraction process is likely to have a significant impact on over and under lying aquifers, which are connected to coal measures from where gas is extracted.
•  Independent scientific assessment must determine that potential impacts to adjacent aquifers can be avoided and managed before CSG projects are approved.

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Groundwater contamination

The quality of groundwater in coal seams is generally inferior to that in over- and underlying aquifers. There is a high risk that poorer quality coal seam water will leak into better quality aquifers from the large number of proposed gas wells and poor well management practices.
There is also a high risk of groundwater contamination caused by hydraulic fracturing, an industry process used to stimulate gas flows by using chemicals and applied at high pressures to fracture the coal seams.

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Many of the chemicals used to fracture the coal seams are toxic and are known to affect human and environmental health.

 

• Independent scientific assessment must determine that inter aquifer contamination can be avoided and managed before CSG projects are approved
• Hydraulic fracturing must not occur until robust scientific assessment has demonstrated that groundwater contamination can be avoided.

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Impacts to springs and groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDE)

The scale of potential long-term adverse environmental impacts to springs and groundwater dependent ecosystems caused by CSG extraction is largely unmeasured.

• Impacts to springs and GDE’s must be avoided. Independent scientific assessment must determine that potential impacts to springs and GDE’s can be avoided and remediated if impacts do occur.
• Protecting springs should be achieved by establishing set back distances around springs where CSG activities are prohibited.
• Using CSG water for beneficial purposes

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While the Government has introduced regulations requiring CSG companies to treat CSG associated water to ‘fit for purpose’ standards, the potential environmental impacts that could occur from using treated CSG water for different purposes has not yet been fully assessed. The environmental impacts that could occur from using treated CSG water for beneficial purposes includes potential changes to soils chemistry, structure and biota; as well as water quality changes in waterways in areas where CSG water is used.

• CSG water used for a beneficial purpose must match the background environmental water quality conditions of areas where it is being used.

• Using waterways to distribute CSG water

CSG companies are seeking to release treated CSG water to rivers to distribute this water to areas where it will be used for beneficial purposes. As waterways in areas where CSG development is occurring are mostly ephemeral, introducing large volumes of CSG water year round to these waterways will change them from being ephemeral to permanently flowing. This will substantially alter the ecological composition and water quality of waterways, which will potentially cause significant adverse impacts to these aquatic environments. For these reasons, QCC does not support CSG water being introduced to river systems.

 

•   CSG water should not be allowed to enter or be introduced to waterways

Disposal of salt and other contaminants

It is estimated that millions of tonnes of salt and other toxic substances will be produced from CSG operations. Under current arrangements CSG companies can hold untreated CSG water and brine effluent from reverse osmosis water treatment plants in storage ponds, and then dispose of this waste in a variety of ways.

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Allowable disposal methods include:

• Creating useable and saleable products,
• Burying residual solid wastes on properties owned by CSG companies or
• By injecting the brine effluent into aquifers with a lesser water quality.

QCC does not support CSG companies being allowed to bury salt on their properties or injecting brine effluent underground due to the inherent environmental risks associated with these disposal methods.   A more environmentally safe disposal method that QCC favours is to require CSG companies to rapidly dehydrate the brine effluent using waste heat generated from water treatment power plants; and then either marketing the residual solid waste or burying it in regulated hazardous substance landfill sites.

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• Injection of brine effluent into aquifers should not be permitted
• Residual solid waste from CSG water treatment processes should only be disposed into registered hazardous substance landfill sites
• Avoiding good quality agricultural land

The CSG industry is seeking to expand into some of Queensland’s prime agricultural areas. The is likely to effect food and fibre production from impacts to groundwater resources that primary producers depend on.

Along with the impacts to groundwater, it is increasingly evident that the number of roadways, pipelines, brine storage dams and other necessary CSG infrastructure will have a significant impact on farming activities and operations.

• CSG exploration and development must be prohibited on good quality agricultural lands

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Avoiding areas of High Ecological Significance (HES)

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Under current legislative arrangements, the only tenure of land that is exempt from CSG exploration and development are National Parks. This means that important areas of High Ecological Significance outside of National Parks, such as wetlands, springs, biodiversity corridors and threatened ecological communities, can be degraded by CSG exploration
and development.

Although CSG companies are required to offset environmental impacts, it is unlikely that the full extent of environmental impacts caused by the expansion of the CSG industry as a whole can be effectively offset. This will result in an overall net loss of environmental values throughout the areas where CSG development occurs. That must not be allowed to occur.

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• CSG exploration and development must be prohibited in areas of HES such as wetlands, springs, biodiversity corridors and threatened ecological communities
• Strategic re-injection of CSG water Estimates indicate that up towards 350,000Ml of groundwater per year could be extracted from coal seams as part of the gas production process.

There are significant concerns about the impacts that may occur to other aquifers that are connected to these coal seams. An effective way to mitigate impacts to over- and underlying aquifers is by strategically re-injecting treated CSG water either back into coal seams or into effected adjacent aquifers.

 

•  Treated CSG water should be re-injected back into coal seams from where it has been extracted or into adjacent aquifers that have been affected by CSG operations
• Moratorium on CSG development

Many of the environmental issues associated with the CSG industry have yet to be satisfactorily addressed. QCC believes that a precautionary approach is needed and is calling for a moratorium to be placed on CSG projects until robust scientific assessment has determined that environmental impacts occurring from CSG operations can be avoided, mitigated and the industry can be managed sustainably.

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•    moratorium should be placed on CSG development until scientific assessment can demonstrate that environmental impacts can be avoided and mitigated

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[Source: Queensland Conservation Community (QCC), 20101001, ^http://qccqld.org.au/docs/Campaigns/SaveWater/CSG%20Position%20Paper.pdf,  >Read Paper 160 kb]

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Threats by Coal Seam Gas to Australia’s Artesian Basin

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‘The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association acknowledge that CSG extraction has potential to deplete or contaminate local aquifers.

There are many of these in the northern Illawarra that recharge streams, creeks, lakes and dams in the water catchments and coastal plain.

The National Water Commission estimate that the Australian CSG industry will extract around 7,500 gigalitres (GL) of produced water from ground water systems over the next 25 years. To put this in perspective, that’s more than 13 times the capacity of Sydney Harbour. They also note that the potential impacts of CSG development on water systems, particularly the cumulative effects of multiple projects, are not well understood….’

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[Source: ^http://stop-csg-illawarra.org/csg-risks/threats-to-water/]

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The coal seam gas industry is facing a rural revolt, with farmers threatening to risk arrest and lock their gates to drilling companies.

Organic farmer, Graham Back, at his property west of Dalby, southern Queensland

He won’t be rolling out the red carpet for drilling companies

[Photo: Cathy Finch Source: The Courier-Mail]

[Read article]

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Bligh’s gas infatuation is killing Gladstone Harbour

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Aerial views show Gladstone Harbour before and after dredging operations began.

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An independent report on Gladstone Harbour is scathing of State Government efforts to discover what is causing major disease problems.

The interim report by fisheries veterinarian and Sydney University lecturer Matt Landos says the Government has failed to adequately monitor animal mortality and used untrained observers despite evidence of a crisis.

Dr Landos says the Government has underestimated turtle deaths, made no baseline study of aquatic animal health before the harbour’s 46 million cubic metre dredging began, made no assessment of acoustic impacts and has not investigated dying coral.

The damning report was paid for by the Gladstone Fishing Research Fund with capital sought from public donations and fishermen.

The port is undergoing major expansion, mostly for the liquefied natural gas industry.

The LNG industrial invasion of Gladstone’s Reef World Heritage  Harbour

..when political gas royalties outweigh Queensland Nature

This will be Bligh’s legacy remembered, not her ‘we are Queenslanders’ spiel.

Labor’s mantra:   ‘jobs jobs jobs’ – while buggering Australia’s environment and local workers,

because Labor jobs mean foreign 457 jobs,

where Labor selfishly reaps industrial exploitation royalties as if it were a foreign power.

Labor is buggering Queensland’s precious Barrier Reef like it is buggering Queenslanders…all for coal seam gas royalties

Why did old Captain Bligh have a cruel reputation?

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Where is Bligh’s empathy for Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef World Heritage?

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Former Queensland Seafood Industry Association president Michael Gardner, who helped organise funding, said yesterday that Dr Landos’ findings were at odds with the Government and Gladstone Ports Corporation view, which was that disease was related more to last year’s wet season than dredging.

46 million cubic metre dredging of Gladstone Harbour for Coals Seam Gas

Killing dugongs, sea turtles and Reef marine life in the process

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Environment Department director-general Jim Reeves said it was incorrect that studies had not been done to assess the impact of dredging. He said Fisheries Queensland had been conducting an extensive fish health survey since August last year and studies were continuing.

The department had monitored Curtis Island turtle populations for decades before dredging began and there was no evidence of turtle deaths being underestimated. All fisheries observers were trained scientists and surveys were conducted in April and June.

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Gladstone now has ‘Exploding Eye’ Barramundi

..thanks Anna

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“So far all we have seen from the Bligh government is flawed water quality monitoring, constant assertions that the problems of marine species’ deaths and fish disease have nothing to do with developments in the harbour and the desire to see developments proceed at breakneck speed.”

“The Gladstone Port Corporation’s dredging program is one of the biggest in our history and we need to know if dredging up historic layers of industrial pollutants as well as the acid sulphate soils that are known to be in the area are linked with this catastrophe.”

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Derec Davies, a Friends of the Earth campaigner

[Source: ^http://indymedia.org.au/2011/11/09/how-to-use-a-bikelock-to-save-the-great-barrier-reef-protest-halts-gladstone-dredging]

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Analysis showed water quality was consistent with historical trends, apart from the impacts of the January 2011 floods.

“There is no crisis for the green turtles and dugong that inhabit the area,” Mr Reeves said.

Australia’s Dugong

A native Queenslander with Existence Rights

has called Gladstone Harbour and its sea grasses home for generations

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Dr Landos said he and Dr Ben Diggles had made preliminary observations of fish health, including barramundi.

“In simple terms, all the barramundi captured were quite sick,” he said. “The vast majority, even those with no apparent external skin abnormalities, displayed tucked up abdomens and all were lethargic when handled. I would not recommend human consumption.”

Dr Landos said that despite the fish having no feed in the gut, there were ample baitfish around upon which they could feed. Mullet sampled did not show any external signs of disease.  A population of 27 queenfish were sampled near the dredge spoil dumping ground. All had skin organism infestations and 18 had skin redness.

“My findings … would suggest that the 2010 flood is unlikely to be involved in their causation,” Dr Landos said.

At Friends Point in the inner harbour, 17 of 76 crabs sampled had mild to severe shell changes. At Colosseum Inlet, south of the harbour, 12 of 33 crabs showed signs of lesions.  Other problems included mangrove dieback, low fish numbers and few signs of juvenile animals.  A final report is expected in one to two months.

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[Source:  ‘Dredging-report-blasts-authorities‘, The Courier-Mail, ^http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/dredging-report-blasts-authorities/story-e6freoof-1226297658256]

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A dead Dugong

– a dead Queenslander in Gladstone Harbour

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The ABC TV Four Corners current affairs Program 8th November 2011 aired an in depth report on port developments in Queensland and their impact on The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park and World Heritage Area.

Watch:  ABC Four Corners programme, by Marian Wilkinson and Clay Hichens:   Great Barrier Grief

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This article is by Scott Jordan, Campaign Coordinator Tarkine National Coalition, initially entitled ‘Shree Minerals’ Impact Statement documentation critically non-compliant‘ dated 20120222..

Shree Minerals – foreign miners pillaging Tasmania’s precious Tarkine wilderness

(Photo courtesy of Tarkine National Coalition, click photo to enlarge)

 

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Tarkine National Coalition has described the Shree Minerals’ Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the proposed Nelson Bay River open cut iron ore mine as a mismatch of omissions, flawed assumptions and misrepresentations.

Key data on endangered orchids is missing,

and projections on impacts on Tasmanian Devil and Spotted-tailed Quoll

are based on flawed and fanciful data.

Spotted-tailed Quoll

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The EIS produced by the company as part of the Commonwealth environmental assessments has failed to produce a report relating to endangered and critically endangered orchid populations in the vicinity of the proposed open cut mine. The soil borne Mychorizza fungus is highly succeptible to changes in hydrology, and is essential to the germination of the area’s native orchids which cannot exist without Mychorizza. Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke included this report as a requirement in the project’s EIS guidelines issued in June 2011.

Australia’s Minister for Environment

Tony Burke

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“Shree Minerals have decided that undertaking the necessary work on the proposal is likely to uncover some inconvenient truths, and so instead of producing scientific reports they are asking us to suspend common sense and accept that a 220 metre deep hole extending 1km long will have no impact on hydrology.” said Tarkine National Coalition spokesperson Scott Jordan.

Utter devastation

A magnetite mine at nearby Savage River

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“It’s a ridiculous notion when you consider that the mine depth will be some 170 metres below the level of the adjacent Nelson Bay River.”

TNC has also questioned the company’s motives in the clear contradictions and misrepresentations in the data relating to projections of Tasmanian devil roadkill from mine related traffic. The company has used a January-February traffic surveys as a current traffic baseline which skews the data due to the higher level of tourist, campers and shackowner during the traditional summer holiday season.

Department of Infrastructure, Energy and Resources (Tasmania) (DIER) data indicates that there is a doubling of vehicles on these road sections between October and January.

The company also asserted an assumed level of mine related traffic that is substantially lower than their own expert produced Traffic Impact Assessment.

The roadkill assumptions were made on an additional 82 vehicles per day in year one, and 34 vehicles per day in years 2-10, while the figures the Traffic Impact Assessment specify 122 vehicles per day in year one, and 89 vehicles per day in ongoing years.

“When you apply the expert Traffic Impact Assessment data and the DIER’s data for current road use, the increase in traffic is 329% in year one and 240% in years 2-10 which contradicts the company’s flawed projections of 89% and 34%”.

“This increase of traffic will, on the company’s formulae, result in up to 32 devil deaths per year, not the 3 per year in presented in the EIS.”
“Shree Minerals either is too incompetent to understand it’s own expert reports, or they have set out to deliberately mislead the Commonwealth and State environmental assessors.”
“Either way, they are unfit to be trusted with a Pilbara style iron ore mine in stronghold of threatened species like the Tarkine.”

The public comment period closed on Monday, and the company now has to compile public comments received and submit them with the EIS to the Commonwealth.

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Discovery of Tasmanian devil facial tumour disease in the Tarkine

Media Release 20120224

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Tarkine National Coalition has described the discovery of Tasmanian Devil Facial Tumour Disease (DFTD) at Mt Lindsay in the Tarkine as a tragedy.

“The Tarkine has been for a number of years the last bastion of disease free devils, and news that the disease has been found in the south eastern zone of the Tarkine is devastating news”, said Tarkine National Coalition spokesperson Scott Jordan.

“It is now urgent that the federal and state governments step up and take immediate action to prevent any factors that may exacerbate or accelerate the transmission of this disease to the remaining healthy populations in the Tarkine”.

“The decisions made today will have a critical impact on the survival of the Devil in the wild. Delay is no longer an option – today is the day for action.”

“They should start by reinstating the Emergency National Heritage Listing and placing an immediate halt on all mineral exploration activity in the Tarkine to allow EPBC assessments.”

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NOTE:   EPBC stands for Australia’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999

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Proposed Mine Site Plan (Direct Shipping Ore) with flows to enter tributaries of Nelson River

(Source: Shree Minerals EIS, 2011)

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“The Nelson Bay Iron Ore Project (ELs 41/2004 & 54/2008) covers the Nelson Bay Magnetite deposit with Inferred Mineral Resources reported to Australasian Joint Ore Reserves Committee (JORC) guidelines. Drilling will look to enlarge the deposit and improve the quality of the resource, currently standing at 6.8 Million tonnes @ 38.2% magnetite at a 20% magnetite cut off. In addition exploration work will look follow up recent drilling of near surface iron oxide mineralisation in an attempt delineate direct shipping ore. Exploration of additional magnetic targets will also be undertaken.”

[Source:  Shree Minerals website, ^http://www.shreeminerals.com/shreemin/scripts/page.asp?mid=16&pageid=27]

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The Irreversible Ecological Damage of Long Wall Mining

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‘Impacts of Longwall Coal Mining on The Environment‘    >Read Report  (700kb)

[Source: Total Environment Centre, NSW, 2007, ^http://www.tec.org.au/component/docman/doc_view/201-longwall-rep07]

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Mining Experience in New South Wales – Waratah Rivulet

[Source:  ^http://riverssos.org.au/mining-in-nsw/waratah-rivulet/]

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The image belows show the shocking damage caused by longwall coal mining to the Waratah Rivulet, which flows into Woronora Dam.

Longwalls have run parallel to and directly under this once pristine waterway in the Woronora Catchment Special Area.  You risk an $11,000 fine if you set foot in the Catchment without permission, yet coal companies can cause irreparable damage like this and get away with it.

Waratah Rivulet is a third order stream that is located just to the west of Helensburgh and feeds into the Woronora Dam from the south. Along with its tributaries, it makes up about 29% of the Dam catchment. The Dam provides both the Sutherland Shire and Helensburgh with drinking water. The Rivulet is within the Sydney Catchment Authority managed Woronora Special Area there is no public access without the permission of the SCA. Trespassers are liable to an $11,000 fine.

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Longwall Mining under Waratah Rivulet

 

Metropolitan Colliery operates under the Woronora Special Area. Excel Coal operated it until October 2006 when Peabody Energy, the world’s largest coal mining corporation, purchased it. The method of coal extraction is longwall mining. Recent underground operations have taken place and still are taking place directly below the Waratah Rivulet and its catchment area.

In 2005 the NSW Scientific Committee declared longwall mining to be a key threatening process (read report below). The Waratah Rivulet was listed in the declaration along with several other rivers and creeks as being damaged by mining. No threat abatement plan was ever completed.

In September 2006, conservation groups were informed that serious damage to the Waratah Rivulet had taken place. Photographs were provided and an inspection was organised through the Sydney Catchment Authority (SCA) to take place on the 24th of November. On November 23rd, the Total Environment Centre met with Peabody Energy at the mining company’s request. They had heard of our forthcoming inspection and wanted to tell us about their operation and future mining plans. Through a PowerPoint presentation they told us we would be shocked by what we would see and that water had drained from the Rivulet but was reappearing further downstream closer to the dam.

The inspection took place on the 24th of November and was attended by officers from the SCA and the Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC), the Total Environment Centre, Colong Foundation, Rivers SOS and two independent experts on upland swamps and sandstone geology. We walked the length of the Rivulet that flows over the longwall panels. Although, similar waterways in the area are flowing healthily, the riverbed was completely dry for much of its length. It had suffered some of the worst cracking we had ever seen as a result of longwall mining. The SCA officers indicated that at one series of pools, water levels had dropped about 3m. We were also told there is anecdotal evidence suggesting the Rivulet has ceased to pass over places never previously known to have stopped flowing.

It appeared that the whole watercourse had tilted to the east as a result of the subsidence and upsidence. Rock ledges that were once flat now sloped.  Iron oxide pollution stains were also present. The SCA also told us that they did not know whether water flows were returning further downstream. There was also evidence of failed attempts at remediation with a distinctly different coloured sand having washed out of cracks and now sitting on the dry river bed or in pools.

Also undermined was Flat Rock Swamp at the southernmost extremity of the longwall panels. It is believed to be the main source of water recharge for the Waratah Rivulet. It is highly likely that the swamp has also been damaged and is sitting on a tilt.

TEC has applied under Freedom of Information legislation to the SCA for documents that refer to the damage to the Waratah Rivulet.

During the meeting with Peabody on 23rd November, the company stated its intentions sometime in 2007 to submit a 3A application under the EP&A Act 1974 (NSW) to mine a further 27 longwall panels that will run under the Rivulet and finish under the Woronora Dam storage area.

This is very alarming given the damage that has already occurred to a catchment that provides the Sutherland Shire & Helensburgh with 29% of their drinking water. The dry bed of Waratah Rivulet above the mining area and the stain of iron oxide pollution may be seen clearly through Google Earth.

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The Bigger Picture

In 2005 Rivers SOS, a coalition of 30 groups, formed with the aim of campaigning for the NSW Government to mandate a safety zone of at least 1km around rivers and creeks threatened by mining in NSW.

The peak environment groups of NSW endorse this position and it forms part of their election policy document.

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Longwall Mining under or close to Rivers and Streams:

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Seven major rivers and numerous creeks in NSW have been permanently damaged by mining operations which have been allowed to go too close to, or under, riverbeds. Some rivers are used as channels for saline and acid wastewater pumped out from mines. Many more are under threat. The Minister for Primary Industries, Ian Macdonald, is continuing to approve operations with the Department of Planning and DEC also involved in the process, as are a range of agencies (EPA, Fisheries, DIPNR, SCA, etc.) on an Interagency Review Committee. This group gives recommendations concerning underground mine plans to Ian Macdonald, but has no further say in his final decision. A document recently obtained under FOI by Rivers SOS shows that an independent consultant to the Interagency Committee recommended that mining come no closer than 350m to the Cataract River, yet the Minister approved mining to come within 60m.

The damage involves multiple cracking of river bedrock, ranging from hairline cracks to cracks up to several centimetres wide, causing water loss and pollution as ecotoxic chemicals are leached from the fractured rocks.

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Aquifers may often be breached.

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Satisfactory remediation is not possible. In addition, rockfalls along mined river gorges are frequent.  The high price of coal and the royalties gained from expanding mines are making it all too tempting for the Government to compromise the integrity of our water catchments and sacrifice natural heritage.

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Longwall Mining in the Catchments

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Longwall coal mining is taking place across the catchment areas south of Sydney and is also proposed in the Wyong catchment. Of particular concern is BHP-B’s huge Dendrobium mine which is undermining the Avon and Cordeaux catchments, part of Sydney’s water supply.

A story in the Sydney Morning Herald in January 2005 stated that the SCA were developing a policy for longwall coal mining within the catchments that would be ready by the middle of that year. This policy is yet to materialise.

The SMP approvals process invariably promises remediation and further monitoring. But damage to rivers continues and applications to mine areapproved with little or no significant conditions placed upon the licence.

Remediation involves grouting some cracks but cannot cover all of the cracks, many of which go undetected, in areas where the riverbed is sandy for example.

Sometimes the grout simply washes out of the crack, as is the case in the Waratah Rivulet.

The SCA was established as a result of the 1998 Sydney water crisis. Justice Peter McClellan, who led the subsequent inquiry, determined that a separate catchment management authority with teeth should be created because, as he said “someone should wake up in the morning owning the issue” of adequate management.

An audit of the SCA and the catchments in 1999 found multiple problems including understaffing, the need to interact with so many State agencies, and enormous pressure from developers. Developers in the catchments include mining companies. In spite of government policies such as SEPP 58, stating that development in catchments should have only a “neutral or beneficial effect” on water quality, longwall coal mining in the catchments have been, and are being, approved by the NSW government.

Overidden by the Mining Act 1992, the SCA appears powerless to halt the damage to Sydney’s water supply.

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Alteration of habitat following subsidence due to longwall mining – key threatening process listing

[Source: ‘Alteration of habitat following subsidence due to longwall mining – key threatening process listing’, Dr Lesley Hughes, ChairpersonScientific Committee, Proposed Gazettal date: 15/07/05, Exhibition period: 15/07/05 – 09/09/05on Department of Environment (NSW) website,^http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/determinations/LongwallMiningKtp.htm]

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NSW Scientific Committee – final determination

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The Scientific Committee, established by the Threatened Species Conservation Act, has made a Final Determination to list Alteration of habitat following subsidence due to longwall mining as a KEY THREATENING PROCESS in Schedule 3 of the Act. Listing of key threatening processes is provided for by Part 2 of the Act.

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The Scientific Committee has found that:

1. Longwall mining occurs in the Northern, Southern and Western Coalfields of NSW. The Northern Coalfields are centred on the Newcastle-Hunter region. The Southern Coalfield lies principally beneath the Woronora, Nepean and Georges River catchments approximately 80-120 km SSW of Sydney. Coalmines in the Western Coalfield occur along the western margin of the Sydney Basin.   Virtually all coal mining in the Southern and Western Coalfields is underground mining.

2. Longwall mining involves removing a panel of coal by working a face of up to 300 m in width and up to two km long. Longwall panels are laid side by side with coal pillars, referred to as “chain pillars” separating the adjacent panels. Chain pillars generally vary in width from 20-50 m wide (Holla and Barclay 2000). The roof of the working face is temporarily held up by supports that are repositioned as the mine face advances (Karaman et al. 2001). The roof immediately above the coal seam then collapses into the void (also known as the goaf) and a collapse zone is formed above the extracted area. This zone is highly fractured and permeable and normally extends above the seam to a height of five times the extracted seam thickness (typical extracted seam thickness is approximately 2-3.5 m) (ACARP 2002). Above the collapse zone is a fractured zone where the permeability is increased to a lesser extent than in the collapse zone. The fractured zone extends to a height above the seam of approximately 20 times the seam thickness, though in weaker strata this can be as high as 30 times the seam thickness (ACARP 2002). Above this level, the surface strata will crack as a result of bending strains, with the cracks varying in size according to the level of strain, thickness of the overlying rock stratum and frequency of natural joints or planes of weakness in the strata (Holla and Barclay 2000).

3. The principal surface impact of underground coal mining is subsidence (lowering of the surface above areas that are mined) (Booth et al. 1998, Holla and Barclay 2000). The total subsidence of a surface point consists of two components, active and residual. Active subsidence, which forms 90 to 95% of the total subsidence in most cases, follows the advance of the working face and usually occurs immediately. Residual subsidence is time-dependent and is due to readjustment and compaction within the goaf (Holla and Barclay 2000). Trough-shaped subsidence profiles associated with longwall mining develop tilt between adjacent points that have subsided different amounts.

Maximum ground tilts are developed above the edges of the area of extraction and may be cumulative if more than one seam is worked up to a common boundary. The surface area affected by ground movement is greater than the area worked in the seam (Bell et al. 2000). In the NSW Southern Coalfield, horizontal displacements can extend for more than one kilometre from mine workings (and in extreme cases in excess of three km) (ACARP 2002, 2003), although at these distances, the horizontal movements have little associated tilt or strain. Subsidence at a surface point is due not only to mining in the panel directly below the point, but also to mining in the adjacent panels. It is not uncommon for mining in each panel to take a year or so and therefore a point on the surface may continue to experience residual subsidence for several years (Holla and Barclay 2000).

4. The degree of subsidence resulting from a particular mining activity depends on a number of site specific factors. Factors that affect subsidence include the design of the mine, the thickness of the coal seam being extracted, the width of the chain pillars, the ratio of the depth of overburden to the longwall panel width and the nature of the overlying strata; sandstones are known to subside less than other substrates such as shales. Subsidence is also dependent on topography, being more evident in hilly terrain than in flat or gently undulating areas (Elsworth and Liu 1995, Holla 1997, Holla and Barclay 2000, ACARP 2001). The extent and width of surface cracking over and within the vicinity of the mined goaf will also decrease with an increased depth of mining (Elsworth and Liu 1995).

5. Longwall mining can accelerate the natural process of ‘valley bulging’ (ACARP 2001, 2002). This phenomenon is indicated by an irregular upward spike in an otherwise smooth subsidence profile, generally co-inciding with the base of the valley. The spike represents a reduced amount of subsidence, known as ‘upsidence’, in the base and sides of the valley and is generally coupled with the horizontal closure of the valley sides (ACARP 2001, 2002). In most cases, the upsidence effects extend outside the valley and include the immediate cliff lines and ground beyond them (ACARP 2002).

6. Mining subsidence is frequently associated with cracking of valley floors and creeklines and with subsequent effects on surface and groundwater hydrology (Booth et al. 1998, Holla and Barclay 2000, ACARP 2001, 2002, 2003). Subsidence-induced cracks occurring beneath a stream or other surface water body may result in the loss of water to near-surface groundwater flows.

If the water body is located in an area where the coal seam is less than approximately 100-120 m below the surface, longwall mining can cause the water body to lose flow permanently. If the coal seam is deeper than approximately 150 m, the water loss may be temporary unless the area is affected by severe geological disturbances such as strong faulting. In the majority of cases, surface waters lost to the sub-surface re-emerge downstream. The ability of the water body to recover is dependent on the width of the crack, the surface gradient, the substrate composition and the presence of organic matter. An already-reduced flow rate due to drought conditions or an upstream dam or weir will increase the impact of water loss through cracking. The potential for closure of surface cracks is improved at sites with a low surface gradient although even temporary cracking, leading to loss of flow, may have long-term effects on ecological function in localised areas. The steeper the gradient, the more likely that any solids transported by water flow will be moved downstream allowing the void to remain open and the potential loss of flows to the subsurface to continue.

A lack of thick alluvium in the streambed may also prolong stream dewatering (by at least 13 years, in one case study in West Virginia, Gill 2000).

Impacts on the flows of ephemeral creeks are likely to be greater than those on permanent creeks (Holla and Barclay 2000). Cracking and subsequent water loss can result in permanent changes to riparian community structure and composition.

7. Subsidence can also cause decreased stability of slopes and escarpments, contamination of groundwater by acid drainage, increased sedimentation, bank instability and loss, creation or alteration of riffle and pool sequences, changes to flood behaviour, increased rates of erosion with associated turbidity impacts, and deterioration of water quality due to a reduction in dissolved oxygen and to increased salinity, iron oxides, manganese, and electrical conductivity (Booth et al. 1998, Booth and Bertsch 1999, Sidle et al. 2000, DLWC 2001, Gill 2000, Stout 2003). Displacement of flows may occur where water from mine workings is discharged at a point or seepage zone remote from the stream, and in some cases, into a completely different catchment. Where subsidence cracks allow surface water to mix with subsurface water, the resulting mixture may have altered chemical properties. The occurrence of iron precipitate and iron-oxidising bacteria is particularly evident in rivers where surface cracking has occurred. These bacteria commonly occur in Hawkesbury Sandstone areas, where seepage through the rock is often rich in iron compounds (Jones and Clark 1991) and are able to grow in water lacking dissolved oxygen. Where the bacteria grow as thick mats they reduce interstitial habitat, clog streams and reduce available food (DIPNR 2003). Loss of native plants and animals may occur directly via iron toxicity, or indirectly via smothering. Long-term studies in the United States indicate that reductions in diversity and abundance of aquatic invertebrates occur in streams in the vicinity of longwall mining and these effects may still be evident 12 years after mining (Stout 2003, 2004).

8. The extraction of coal and the subsequent cracking of strata surrounding the goaf may liberate methane, carbon dioxide and other gases. Most of the gas is removed by the ventilation system of the mine but some gas remains within the goaf areas. Gases tend to diffuse upwards through any cracks occurring in the strata and be emitted from the surface (ACARP 2001). Gas emissions can result in localised plant death as anaerobic conditions are created within the soil (Everett et al. 1998).

9. Subsidence due to longwall mining can destabilise cliff-lines and increase the probability of localised rockfalls and cliff collapse (Holla and Barclay 2000, ACARP 2001, 2002). This has occurred in the Western Coalfield and in some areas of the Southern Coalfield (ACARP 2001). These rockfalls have generally occurred within months of the cliffline being undermined but in some cases up to 18 years after surface cracking first became visible following mining (ACARP 2001). Changes to cliff-line topography may result in an alteration to the environment of overhangs and blowouts. These changes may result in the loss of roosts for bats and nest sites for cliff-nesting birds.

10. Damage to some creek systems in the Hunter Valley has been associated with subsidence due to longwall mining. Affected creeks include Eui Creek, Wambo Creek, Bowmans Creek, Fishery Creek and Black Creek (Dept of Sustainable Natural Resources 2003, in lit.). Damage has occurred as a result of loss of stability, with consequent release of sediment into the downstream environment, loss of stream flow, death of fringing vegetation, and release of iron rich and occasionally highly acidic leachate. In the Southern Coalfields substantial surface cracking has occurred in watercourses within the Upper Nepean, Avon, Cordeaux, Cataract, Bargo, Georges and Woronora catchments, including Flying Fox Creek, Wongawilli Creek, Native Dog Creek and Waratah Rivulet. The usual sequence of events has been subsidence-induced cracking within the streambed, followed by significant dewatering of permanent pools and in some cases complete absence of surface flow.

11. The most widely publicised subsidence event in the Southern Coalfields was the cracking of the Cataract riverbed downstream of the Broughtons Pass Weir to the confluence of the Nepean River. Mining in the vicinity began in 1988 with five longwall panels having faces of 110 m that were widened in 1992 to 155 m. In 1994, the river downstream of the longwall mining operations dried up (ACARP 2001, 2002). Water that re-emerged downstream was notably deoxygenated and heavily contaminated with iron deposits; no aquatic life was found in these areas (Everett et al. 1998). In 1998, a Mining Wardens Court Hearing concluded that 80% of the drying of the Cataract River was due to longwall mining operations, with the balance attributed to reduced flows regulated by Sydney Water. Reduction of the surface river flow was accompanied by release of gas, fish kills, iron bacteria mats, and deterioration of water quality and instream habitat. Periodic drying of the river has continued, with cessation of flow recorded on over 20 occasions between June 1999 and October 2002 (DIPNR 2003). At one site, the ‘Bubble Pool”, localised water loss up to 4 ML/day has been recorded (DIPNR 2003).

Piezometers indicated that there was an unusually high permeability in the sandstone, indicating widespread bedrock fracturing (DIPNR 2003). High gas emissions within and around areas of dead vegetation on the banks of the river have been observed and it is likely that this dieback is related to the generation of anoxic conditions in the soil as the migrating gas is oxidised (Everett et al. 1998). An attempt to rectify the cracking by grouting of the most severe crack in 1999 was only partially successful (AWT 2000). In 2001, water in the Cataract River was still highly coloured, flammable gas was still being released and flow losses of about 50% (3-3.5 ML/day) still occurring (DLWC 2001). Environmental flow releases of 1.75 ML/day in the Cataract River released from Broughtons Pass Weir were not considered enough to keep the river flowing or to maintain acceptable water quality (DIPNR 2003).

12. Subsidence associated with longwall mining has contributed to adverse effects (see below) on upland swamps. These effects have been examined in most detail on the Woronora Plateau (e.g. Young 1982, Gibbins 2003, Sydney Catchment Authority, in lit.), although functionally similar swamps exist in the Blue Mountains and on Newnes Plateau and are likely to be affected by the same processes. These swamps occur in the headwaters of the Woronora River and O’Hares Creek, both major tributaries of the Georges River, as well as major tributaries of the Nepean River, including the Cataract and Cordeaux Rivers. The swamps are exceptionally species rich with up to 70 plant species in 15 m2 (Keith and Myerscough 1993) and are habitats of particular conservation significance for their biota. The swamps occur on sandstone in valleys with slopes usually less than ten degrees in areas of shallow, impervious substrate formed by either the bedrock or clay horizons (Young and Young 1988). The low gradient, low discharge streams cannot effectively flush sediment so they lack continuous open channels and water is held in a perched water table. The swamps act as water filters, releasing water slowly to downstream creek systems thus acting to regulate water quality and flows from the upper catchment areas (Young and Young 1988).

13. Upland swamps on the Woronora Plateau are characterised by ti-tree thicket, cyperoid heath, sedgeland, restioid heath and Banksia thicket with the primary floristic variation being related to soil moisture and fertility (Young 1986, Keith and Myerscough 1993). Related swamp systems occur in the upper Blue Mountains including the Blue Mountains Sedge Swamps (also known as hanging swamps) which occur on steep valley sides below an outcropping claystone substratum and the Newnes Plateau Shrub Swamps and Coxs River Swamps which are also hydrologically dependent on the continuance of specific topographic and geological conditions (Keith and Benson 1988, Benson and Keith 1990). The swamps are subject to recurring drying and wetting, fires, erosion and partial flushing of the sediments (Young 1982, Keith 1991). The conversion of perched water table flows into subsurface flows through voids, as a result of mining-induced subsidence may significantly affect the water balance of upland swamps (eg Young and Wray 2000). The scale of this impact is currently unknown, however, changes in vegetation may not occur immediately. Over time, areas of altered hydrological regime may experience a modification to the vegetation community present, with species being favoured that prefer the new conditions. The timeframe of these changes is likely to be long-term. While subsidence may be detected and monitored within months of a mining operation, displacement of susceptible species by those suited to altered conditions is likely to extend over years to decades as the vegetation equilibrates to the new hydrological regime (Keith 1991, NPWS 2001). These impacts will be exacerbated in periods of low flow. Mine subsidence may be followed by severe and rapid erosion where warping of the swamp surface results in altered flows and surface cracking creates nick-points (Young 1982). Fire regimes may also be altered, as dried peaty soils become oxidised and potentially flammable (Sydney Catchment Authority, in lit.) (Kodela et al. 2001).

14. The upland swamps of the Woronora Plateau and the hanging swamps of the Blue Mountains provide habitat for a range of fauna including birds, reptiles and frogs. Reliance of fauna on the swamps increases during low rainfall periods. A range of threatened fauna including the Blue Mountains Water Skink, Eulamprus leuraensis, the Giant Dragonfly, Petalura gigantea, the Giant Burrowing Frog, Heleioporus australiacus, the Red-crowned Toadlet, Pseudophryne australis, the Stuttering Frog Mixophyes balbus and Littlejohn’s Tree Frog, Litoria littlejohni, are known to use the swamps as habitat. Of these species, the frogs are likely to suffer the greatest impacts as a result of hydrological change in the swamps because of their reliance on the water within these areas either as foraging or breeding habitat. Plant species such as Persoonia acerosa, Pultenaea glabra, P. aristata and Acacia baueri ssp. aspera are often recorded in close proximity to the swamps.

Cliffline species such as Epacris hamiltonii and Apatophyllum constablei that rely on surface or subsurface water may also be affected by hydrological impacts on upland swamps, as well as accelerated cliff collapse associated with longwall mining.

15. Flora and fauna may also be affected by activities associated with longwall mining in addition to the direct impacts of subsidence. These activities include clearing of native vegetation and removal of bush rock for surface facilities such as roads and coal wash emplacement and discharge of mine water into swamps and streams. Weed invasion, erosion and siltation may occur following vegetation clearing or enrichment by mine water. Clearing of native vegetation, Bushrock removal, Invasion of native plant communities by exotic perennial grasses and Alteration to the natural flow regimes of rivers and streams and their floodplains and wetlands are listed as Key Threatening Processes under the Threatened Species Conservation Act (1995).

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The following threatened species and ecological communities are known to occur in areas affected by subsidence due to longwall mining and their habitats are likely to be altered by subsidence and mining-associated activities:

Endangered Species

 

• Epacris hamiltonii    a shrub
• Eulamprus leuraensis    Blue Mountains Water Skink
• Hoplocephalus bungaroides    Broad-headed Snake
• Isoodon obesulus    Southern Brown Bandicoot
• Petalura gigantea    Giant Dragonfly

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Vulnerable species

 

• Acacia baueri subsp. aspera
• Apatophyllum constablei
• Boronia deanei
• Cercartetus nanus    Eastern Pygmy Possum
• Epacris purpurascens var. purpurascens
• Grevillea longifolia
• Heleioporus australiacus    Giant Burrowing Frog
• Ixobrychus flavicollis    Black Bittern
• Leucopogon exolasius
• Litoria littlejohni    Littlejohn’s Tree Frog
• Melaleuca deanei
• Mixophyes balbus    Stuttering Frog
• Myotis adversus    Large-footed Myotis
• Persoonia acerosa
• Potorous tridactylus    Long-nosed Potoroo
• Pseudophryne australis    Red-crowned Toadlet
• Pteropus poliocephalus    Grey-headed Flying Fox
• Pterostylis pulchella
• Pultenaea aristata
• Pultenaea glabra
• Tetratheca juncea
• Varanus rosenbergi    Rosenberg’s Goanna

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Endangered Ecological Communities

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• Genowlan Point Allocasuarina nana Heathland
• Newnes Plateau Shrub Swamp in the Sydney Basin Bioregion
• O’Hares Creek Shale Forest
• Shale/Sandstone Transition Forest

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Species and populations of species not currently listed as threatened but that may become so as a result of habitat alteration following subsidence due to longwall mining include:

• Acacia ptychoclada
• Almaleea incurvata
• Darwinia grandiflora
• Dillwynia stipulifera
• Epacris coricea
• Grevillea acanthifolia subsp. acanthifolia
• Hydromys chrysogaster    Water rat
• Lomandra fluviatilis
• Olearia quercifolia
• Pseudanthus pimelioides

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16. Mitigation measures to repair cracking creek beds have had only limited success and are still considered experimental (ACARP 2002). Cracks less than 10 mm wide may eventually reseal without active intervention provided there is a clay fraction in the soil and at least some water flow is maintained.

Cracks 10-50 mm wide may be sealed with a grouting compound or bentonite.

Cracks wider than 50 mm require concrete (ACARP 2002). Pattern grouting in the vicinity of Marhnyes Hole in the Georges River has been successful at restoring surface flows and reducing pool drainage following fracturing of the riverbed (International Environmental Consultants 2004). Grouting of cracks also appears to have been relatively effective in Wambo Creek in the Hunter Valley. Installation of a grout curtain in the Cataract River, however, has been only partially successful and it was concluded in 2002, after rehabilitation measures had taken place, that the environment flows released from Broughtons Pass Weir by the Sydney Catchment Authority were insufficient to keep the Cataract River flowing or to maintain acceptable water quality (DIPNR 2003). Mitigation measures themselves may have additional environmental impacts due to disturbance from access tracks, the siting of drilling rigs, removal of riparian vegetation, and unintended release of the grouting material into the water. Furthermore, even measures that are successful in terms of restoring flows involve temporary rerouting of surface flows while mitigation is carried out (generally for 2-3 weeks at each grouting site). Planning for remediation measures may also be hampered by the lack of predictability of some impacts, and difficulties gaining access to remote areas where remedial works are needed. The long-term success of mitigation measures such as grouting is not yet known. It is possible that any ongoing subsidence after grouting may reopen cracks or create new ones.

Further, it is not yet known whether the clay substance bentonite, which is often added to the cement in the grouting mix, is sufficiently stable to prevent shrinkage. Grouting under upland and hanging swamps that have no definite channel is probably not feasible.

17. Empirical methods have been developed from large data sets to predict conventional subsidence effects (ACARP 2001, 2002, 2003). In general, these models have proved more accurate when predicting the potential degree of subsidence in flat or gently undulating terrain than in steep topography (ACARP 2003). A major issue identified in the ACARP (2001, 2002) reports was the lack of knowledge about horizontal stresses in geological strata, particularly those associated with river valleys. These horizontal stresses appear to play a major role in the magnitude and extent of surface subsidence impacts. The cumulative impacts of multiple panels also appear to have been poorly monitored. The general trend in the mining industry in recent years toward increased panel widths (from 200 up to 300 m), which allows greater economies in the overall costs of extraction, means that future impacts will tend to be greater than those in the past (ACARP 2001, 2002).

18. In view of the above the Scientific Committee is of the opinion that Alteration of habitat following subsidence due to longwall mining adversely affects two or more threatened species, populations or ecological communities, or could cause species, populations or ecological communities that are not threatened to become threatened.

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References

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ACARP (2001) ‘Impacts of Mine Subsidence on the Strata & Hydrology of River Valleys – Management Guidelines for Undermining Cliffs, Gorges and River Systems’. Australian Coal Association Research Program Final Report C8005 Stage 1, March 2001.

ACARP (2002) ‘Impacts of Mine Subsidence on the Strata & Hydrology of River Valleys – Management Guidelines for Undermining Cliffs, Gorges and River Systems’. Australian Coal Association Research Program Final Report C9067 Stage 2, June 2002.

ACARP (2003) ‘Review of Industry Subsidence Data in Relation to the Influence of Overburden Lithology on Subsidence and an Initial Assessment of a Sub-Surface Fracturing Model for Groundwater Analysis’. Australian Coal Association Research Program Final Report C10023, September 2003.

AWT (2000) ‘Investigation of the impact of bed cracking on water quality in the Cataract River.’ Prepared for the Dept. of Land and Water Conservation Sydney South Coast Region. AWT Report no. 2000/0366.

Bell FG, Stacey TR, Genske DD (2000) Mining subsidence and its effect on the environment: some differing examples. Environmental Geology 40, 135-152.

Benson DH, Keith DA (1990) The natural vegetation of the Wallerawang 1:100,000 map sheet. Cunninghamia 2, 305-335.

Booth CJ, Bertsch LP (1999) Groundwater geochemistry in shallow aquifers above longwall mines in Illinois, USA. Hydrogeology Journal 7, 561-575.

Booth CJ, Spande ED, Pattee CT, Miller JD, Bertsch LP (1998) Positive and negative impacts of longwall mine subsidence on a sandstone aquifer.

Environmental Geology 34, 223-233.

DIPNR (2003) ‘Hydrological and water quality assessment of the Cataract River; June 1999 to October 2002: Implications for the management of longwall coal mining.’ NSW Department of Infrastructure, Planning and Environment, Wollongong.

DLWC (2001) ‘Submission to the Commission of Inquiry into the Proposed Dendrobium Underground Coal Mine Project by BHP Steel (AIS) Pty Ltd, Wollongong, Wingecarribee & Wollondilly Local Government Areas’. Department of Land and Water Conservation, July 2001.

Elsworth D, Liu J (1995) Topographic influence of longwall mining on ground-water supplies. Ground Water 33, 786-793.

Everett M, Ross T, Hunt G (eds) (1998) ‘Final Report of the Cataract River Taskforce. A report to the Upper Nepean Catchment Management Committee of the studies of water loss in the lower Cataract River during the period 1993 to 1997.’ Cataract River Taskforce, Picton.

Gibbins L (2003) A geophysical investigation of two upland swamps, Woronora Plateau, NSW, Australia. Honours Thesis, Macquarie University.

Gill DR (2000) Hydrogeologic analysis of streamflow in relation to undergraound mining in northern West Virginia. MSc thesis, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia.

Holla L (1997) Ground movement due to longwall mining in high relief areas in New South Wales, Australia. International Journal of Rock Mechanics and Mining Sciences 34, 775-787.

Holla L, Barclay E (2000) ‘Mine subsidence in the Southern Coalfield, NSW, Australia’. Mineral Resources of NSW, Sydney.

International Environmental Consultants Pty Ltd (2004) ‘Pattern grouting remediation activities: Review of Environmental Effects Georges River Pools 5-22. May, 2004’.

Jones DC, Clark NR (eds) (1991) Geology of the Penrith 1:100,000 Sheet 9030, NSW. Geological Survey, NSW Department of Minerals and Energy.

Karaman A, Carpenter PJ, Booth CJ (2001) Type-curve analysis of water-level changes induced by a longwall mine. Environmental Geology 40, 897-901.

Keith DA (1991) Coexistence and species diversity in upland swamp vegetation. PhD thesis. University of Sydney.

Keith DA (1994) Floristics, structure and diversity of natural vegetation in the O’Hares Creek catchment, south of Sydney. Cunninghamia 3, 543-594.

Keith DA, Benson DH (1988) The natural vegetation of the Katoomba 1:100,000 map sheet. Cunninghamia 2, 107-143.

Kodela PG, Sainty GR, Bravo FJ, James TA (2001) ‘Wingecarribee Swamp flora survey and related management issues.’ Sydney Catchment Authority, New South Wales.

Keith DA, Myerscough PJ (1983) Floristics and soil relations of upland swamp vegetation near Sydney. Australian Journal of Ecology 18, 325-344.

NPWS (2001) ‘NPWS Primary Submission to the Commission of Inquiry into the Dendrobium Coal Project’. National Parks and Wildlife Service, July 2001.

Sidle RC, Kamil I, Sharma A, Yamashita S (2000) Stream response to subsidence from underground coal mining in central Utah. Environmental Geology 39, 279-291.

Stout BM III (2003) ‘Impact of longwall mining on headwater streams in northern West Virginia’. Final Report, June 2003 for the West Virginia Water Research Institute.

Stout BM III (2004) ‘Do headwater streams recover from longwall mining impacts in northern West Virginia’. Final Report, August 2004 for the West Virginia Water Research Institute.

Young ARM (1982) Upland swamps (dells) on the Woronora Plateau, N.S.W. PhD thesis, University of Wollongong.

Young ARM (1986) The geomorphic development of upland dells (upland swamps) on the Woronora Plateau, NSW, Australia. Zeitschrift für Geomorphologie N.F. Bd 30, Heft 3,312-327.

Young RW, Wray RAL (2000) The geomorphology of sandstones in the Sydney Region. In McNally GH and Franklin BJ eds Sandstone City – Sydney’s Dimension Stone and other Sandstone Geomaterials. Proceedings of a symposium held on 7th July 2000, 15th Australian Geological Convention, University of

Technology Sydney. Monograph No. 5, Geological Society of Australia, Springwood, NSW. Pp 55-73.

Young RW, Young ARM (1988) ‘Altogether barren, peculiarly romantic’: the sandstone lands around Sydney. Australian Geographer 19, 9-25.

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Grey Goshawk (white morph)  (Accipiter novaehollandiae)

[Photo courtesy of Ákos Lumnitzer with permission, ^http://www.amatteroflight.com/]

Click photo to enlarge.

Play call of Grey Goshawk

Source:  ^http://www.aviceda.org/audio/?p=248

 

The white form of the Grey Goshawk is the only pure white raptor in the world.  In Tasmania, Grey Goshawks, are listed as endangered species, with their nesting habitat affected by logging.   It favours tall closed forests including rainforests and particularly those of the large wild tracts of tall forest across the Tarkine.

Grey Goshawks form permanent pairs that defend a home territory year round. Both sexes construct a stick nest lined with leaves high in a tree fork, and often re-use the same nest.  While the female does most of the incubation, the male relieves her when she needs to feed, and catches most of the food for the young, which the female tears up for them to eat.

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[Source: ^http://birdsinbackyards.net/species/Accipiter-novaehollandiae]

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“The Tarkine rations nothing. 

It gives its all in a fury of excess that is raw coast, mountain ranges,

dark gashes of gullies and the benediction of unbroken tracts of old-man rainforest.”

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~ ‘Tarkine‘ (photographic book), 2010, edited by Ralph Ashton, inspired by Robert Purves AM, published by Allen & Unwin.

^http://www.allenandunwin.com/default.aspx?page=94&book=9781742372846

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Bordered by the Arthur River in the north, the Pieman River in the south, the Murchison Highway in the east, and the ocean to the west, Tasmania’s wild Tarkine is a magnificent wilderness sanctuary but threatened by ongoing industrial interests from mining and logging, as well as from road making, off-road vehicles, poaching, cattle and exploitative tourism.

Scott Jordan from the Tarkine National Coalition says:

“We see it as an area containing great wilderness values, a lot of natural – as well as cultural – values.  We see it as an area that really needs to be protected and enjoyed.”

Volunteer Tasmanian Environmentalist, Scott Jordan

 

The Tarkine National Coalition wants to see it made a national park, and protected under a World Heritage listing, before it is ruined and goes the same way as Mount Lyell.

Visit: The Tarkine Coalition’s website:  ^http://www.tarkine.org/

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With Tasmania’s alternating Labor and Liberal governments still hell bent on carving up Tasmania’s remaining wilderness, they have divvied up more than 50 mining exploration licences in the Tarkine.

There are some ten proposed mines set to dig up the Tarkine!

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Whereas Alan Daley from industrial miner Tasmania Magnesite has plans to develop an open cut mine.  He is reticent about identifying the Tarkine…“I’m not sure what the Tarkine is. To my knowledge there isn’t a boundary yet defined as the Tarkine.”  I understand the marketing value.”

Tasmania Magnesite (Beacon Hill Resources) wants to establish an open cut magnesite mine within the Keith River area, Shree Minerals wants an open cut iron ore mine at Nelson Bay River, and Venture Minerals are planning open cut mining for tin and tungsten in the rainforest at Mount Lindsay.

Industrial Miner, Alan Daley
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[Source:  ‘A week in the west‘: the Tarkine’, by Eliza Wood, ABC Rural, 20111027, ^http://www.abc.net.au/rural/content/2011/s3349649.htm]

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Savage River Mine

This is on the northern boundary of the Tarkine

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Editor: 

It has become apparent to this observer, that many of those with a broad commitment to protecting Nature are comparatively young.  Whereas those ‘baby-boomer‘ industrial executives and old school Labor/Liberal politicians seem narrower in outlook, committed to pursuing 20th Century exploitation as if such business-as-usual plundering of Nature is limitless.   May be I’m generalising.

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Tim Flannery:

“One of the greatest tragedies of Tasmania is that its European inhabitants have always wanted their island home to be something it is not – a little England perhaps, or the world’s largest sheep paddock or even, in later years, the Ruhr of the South (which was to be powered by Tasmania’s out-of-control hydro schemes).  All such dreams have failed, but nevertheless their pursuit has cost the present generation dearly.”        (Tarkine, 2010, p.4-5).

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Tasmania’s Queenstown

Left behind by 19th and 20th Century industrial miners

This is south of the Tarkine

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Grey Goshawk spreading its wings in flight

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Chinese-owned Yancoal’s Austar Coal Mine in the Hunter Valley, yesterday was found guilty by the Land and Environment Court in New South Wales of gross pollution of Bellbird Creek near Cessnock back in July 2010.   Wastewater from the mine’s antiquated on-site septic system was allowed to seep into the creek, killing aquatic wildlife.   But it has taken a year and a half for the court to finally prosecute the offence brought before it by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).  Why?

Septic pollution of Bellbird Creek

near Cessnock, Hunter Valley, New South Wales, Australia

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Yancoal Australia’s parent company is Chinese-based Yanzhou Coal Mining Company,  which is ultimately owned by the Shandong provincial government of China.  Yanzhou promotes itself as being one of the safest and most productive users of Longwall Top Coal Caving technology (LTCC).  Visit its website: ^http://www.yancoalaustralia.com.au/key-assets/austar-coal-mine/

Under its ‘Community Awareness’ section, subsidiary Yancoal Australia offers a scholarship program to assist undergraduate students choosing to pursue a career in the mining industry. How is this community awareness?  Obviously there is a lack of environmental awareness.  Mining profits are going back to China, at the Hunter Valley’s expense and at Bellbird’s expense.

The logo is very clear about the source and the impact

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The court has fined Austar $115,000 for the pollution, including ordering Austar Coal Mine to pay $75,000 towards an environmental rehabilitation project and $42,000 in the EPA’s legal costs.  This will be on top of Austar’s own legal costs.   Austar has also been ordered to publish details of the offence in a local newspaper and industry magazine.

Chief Environmental Regulator for the Environment Protection Authority (EPA), Mark Gifford said “The wastewater contained detergent and effluent from bathhouse facilities located on the Austar site and caused large clumps of white foam up to 2 metres high to be washed downstream.

“The elevated levels of detergent, nutrients and faecal matter along approximately 2km of Bellbird Creek were toxic to aquatic life,” Mr Gifford said.

“This incident could have been prevented if Austar had an appropriate system in place to inspect, monitor and maintain the 90 year old onsite septic system.”

EPA Regional Manager Graham Clarke says it was not a minor incident.

“These are very large scale facilities, obviously bathhouse for the mine facilities they’re not just domestic systems and clearly large amounts of detergent and pollutants were coming from the system into the Bellbird Creek,” he said.  “So it’s affected about two kilometres of the waterway at the time so these are not small incidents.”

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But something is clearly amiss.  For Austar’s mine pollution of detergent, nutrients and faecal matter to ‘extend two kilometres downstream‘ along Bellbird Creek and for ‘large clumps of white foam up to 2 metres high‘, this was not ‘seepage‘ – more like full-throttle pumping!   Downstream also involves flowing through the village of Bellbird, effectively creating an open sewer through Bellbird.

Following NSW Labor Government approval for Austar Coal Mine to begin longwall mining on its Hunter Valley lease, the company published its Community Information Sheet 4 dated June 2006, which on page 2 states:

‘Upgrades to the water management system to improve the recycling of mine water. Austar has been working closely with the Department of Environment and Conservation (EPA) to optimize water recycling and reduce dependency on external water supplies. The proposed improvements will include upgraded pumps, pipelines and water treatment facilities resulting in the Austar mine being almost self-sufficient in water supplies.’

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The EPA has clearly been negligent in its monitoring, but then the EPA has no watchdog.  To fine Yancoal $115,000 is a mere slap on the wrist.  Yancoal recorded $1 billion in revenue in 2010, and sold 11 million tonnes of coal from its five operating mines on the east coast.  So Yancoal has been fined 0.0115% of its annual revenue – petty cash!     [Source: ‘Wesfarmers agrees to $300m Premier Coal deal with Yancoal’, by Nick Evans, Business Reporter, PerthNow, 20110928, ^http://www.perthnow.com.au/business/local-business/wesfarmers-agrees-to-300m-premier-coal-deal-with-yancoal/story-e6frg2s3-1226148929703]

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• Where is the EPA’s Environmental Impact Statement made available to the local community?
• What has been the ecological cost?
• Where have the pollutants ended up?
• What is the risk to public health of Bellbird and downstream communities?
• What is the full cost of clean up to restore Bellbird Creek and its affected downstream waterways to a before pollution condition and to reinstate the ecological health of the waterways?
• Given Yancoal holds significant coal assets in Queensland and New South Wales, what monitoring is the EPA in those states doing, given that Yancoal has demonstrated that it cannot be trusted to protect the environment?

 

 Yancoal’s Mining Leases in the Hunter Valley – set for underground long wall mining

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[Sources: ‘Hunter Valley mine fined for polluting creek’, ABC, 20111213, ^http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-13/hunter-valley-mine-fined-for-polluting-creek/3729336/?site=newcastle, ^http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/media/DecMedia11121301.htm, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-14/mine-fine-for-polluting-creek/3729942]

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Red-backed Fairy-wren of the rivers of the Hunter Valley

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The Red-backed Fairy-wren (Malurus melanocephalus) is a passerine bird in the Maluridae family. It is found only in Australia along the coasts of rivers. These rivers are the Hunter Valley in New South Wales and the Kimberley which is the northern portion of Western Australia.

[Source: ^http://www.redorbit.com/education/reference_library/science_1/birds/2582912/redbacked_fairywren/index.html]

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The following article was ‘borrowed’ from CanDoBetter.net under the title ‘The Tarkine Wilderness under threat‘ by author Vivienne Ortega dated 20111207:

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‘Tasmania’s Tarkine Wilderness Endangered!’

The Tarkine region is located in the north-west of Tasmania. The area encompasses 447,000 hectares of wilderness including the Southern Hemispheres largest single tract of temperate rain forest, a wild coastline with an extraordinary wealth of Aboriginal Cultural Heritage sites. It’s the habitat for over 50 threatened species.  The extensive rainforests, beautiful river gorges, buttongrass mountain tops, flowering heathlands and long wild beaches combine to make the Tarkine one of the world’s great treasures.

These rainforests are important for their flora which has links to the ancient continent of Gondwana, and for their lichens and fossils which help tell the story of Australia’s ancient flora and its evolution.  The Tarkine is a  sensitive region rich in mega-diversity.  It’s one of the world’s last remaining temperate rain-forests, the home of the Tasmanian Devil and many other precious species.

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Tarkine National Heritage a must

How many places on Earth still look like this?

What an incredible asset of  eco-experience (not dodgy eco-tourism) wild Tasmania offers the world’s discerning explorer?

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The Tarkine must be put on the National Heritage List.  The heritage assessment of The Tarkine will help ensure that the heritage values are considered in decision-making, so heritage protection is balanced with the social and economic aspirations of the Tasmanian community. Short-term economic benefits should not be at the expense of the un-quantifiable value of ancient woodlands, rugged coastlines, and forest habitat destruction.  Mining companies like Venture Minerals are desperate to exploit the minerals beneath Tasmania’s environmentally significant Tarkine area.

Enter the Tin Men

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Demand for metals superior to Tasmania’s ecology?

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Chinese demand for base metals such as gold, iron, tin, zinc, lead, copper is at an all time high,  and this would mean logging, pollution, roads, and heavy traffic destroying the landscape and pristine rivers.

Environment Minister Tony Burke was called on to immediately include the Tarkine on the emergency National Heritage Listing amid concerns about the impact on the Tasmanian devil population of a revised tourist road project.   He denied that he made a promise to do so.  His predecessor, Peter Garrett, first gave the Tarkine wilderness a one-year emergency listing, which Mr Burke let expire.  Since then he has let a British mining company test drill in the area. Mr Burke says the new plan for a tourist road is not the same as the original 132-kilometre loop road plan that was subject to a now lapsed emergency listing.  One road is not similarly destructive an another?   Mining and road proposals threaten to carve up Tasmania’s unprotected the Tarkine wilderness area, local defenders say.

Venture Mineral’s Mt Lindsay tin, tungsten and iron mining proposal, coupled with the revival of the controversial Tarkine link road proposal, should have given Mr Burke grounds to reinstate Tarkine’s emergency National Heritage listing.  Heritage listings would not stop mining, but developments would have to pass more rigorous and critical environmental tests.

The Mount Lindsay tin project is the largest of several mines planned around the Tarkine in an emerging new Tasmanian environmental battle. The Tarkine National Coalition said up to nine new open cut mines are in development there.  Venture Minerals predict $1 billion in revenue, with more than 500 jobs in construction and 200 in operation.  Surely the threats of mining are enough reasons for an emergency heritage listing for the Tarkine?

Mr Burke says the principle that a heritage listing automatically locks out all development is wrong.  He says with or without a heritage listing, environmental protection remains.  “Developments” and “protection” are inherently contradictory.   Mr Jordan who heads the Tarkine National Coalition says Mr Burke’s decision to lift the heritage listing means other mining companies will not be scrutinised as closely as Beacon Hill Resources.  The whole area should be protected as a national park.

The interests of miners are being placed above the Minister’s obligations to the environment. All three proposed mining projects will have secured Commonwealth environmental permits during the 18 month period he had at his disposal, allowing them to avoid scrutiny against National Heritage criteria. They will also be allowed to continue exploration drilling and associated access roading without need for Commonwealth assessments.

The mining will cause havoc to the pristine condition of the area. There is nothing “sustainable” now. It’s just window-dressing. What about the costs and long term damage of these industries and jobs? Mr Burke is supposed to represent the environment, not the mining industries. As with his population strategy, that come to nothing, he is now abrogating his duty to protect one of the last temperate rain-forest areas in the world.

.It is wrong to destroy sacred and holy places to plunder their riches, and the same applies to Nature’s sacred places.

A proud colonial relic of a Tasmanian old growth forest raped, pillaged and plundered

 

 

…and today colonial logger descendants, hanging on to the past, are paupers.

(Photo by editor 20110928, free in public domain – click to enlarge, then click to enlarge again)

 

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^Save the Tarkine before it is massacred down to this!

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Please email a demand to the ultimate decision maker of our temporary time:

Australia’s current Environment Minister: Tony.Burke.MP@aph.gov.au

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“..this awe-inspiring, largely unknown part of Australia – a wilderness that has survived, virtually untouched, for over 65 million years from its Gondwana heritage, but which is today under increasing threat from Man.”

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~ Robert Purves, June 2010, in Foreword of the book ‘The Tarkine’, edited by Ralph Ashton and published by Allen & Unwin, [Available at ^http://www.allenandunwin.com/default.aspx?page=94&book=9781742372846]

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The Tarkine’s mystical beauty of an ancient Giant Myrtle (Nothofagus cunninghammii)

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Urgent press releases from the local champions trying to save The Tarkine:

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‘New threats to the Tarkine’

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(Source: The Wilderness Society, Tasmania, ^http://www.wilderness.org.au/regions/tasmania/new-threats-to-the-tarkine)

 

We all know the Tarkine is an environmental jewel – but when mining companies look at this special place, they see the glint of valuable metals instead. Gold, iron, tin, zinc, lead, copper – you name it and chances are it can be found in the mineral-rich bedrock beneath the Tarkine.

With Australia in the grip of an extraction bonanza, and Chinese demand for base metals at an all time high, the pressure to open up the Tarkine to mining is building.  So far, 12 mines have been proposed for the Tarkine over the next two years, along with 56 licences for mineral exploration in the area. If even a fraction of these mines go ahead, this wild land of rugged coastline, pristine rivers and forested hills could be compromised – criss-crossed with exploration tracks and roads and dotted with waste dumps, pits and trenches.

The Tarkine is of huge environmental significance. It is one of the largest remaining tracts of temperate rainforest on earth, and home to a huge variety of species including:

• Tasmanian devils
• Tasmanian wedge- tailed eagles
• Spotted-tailed quolls
• Southern bell frogs
• White goshawks
• Giant freshwater lobster
• Eastern barred bandicoots
• Orange-bellied parrots
• and the Huon pine.

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Tasmania’s Giant Freshwater Lobster (Astacopsis gouldi)

It is found only in northern Tasmanian streams (particularly in The Tarkine) and rivers flowing into Bass Strait.

It is found nowhere else in the world, yet is threatened by illegal fishing, land clearing and forestry.

(Source:  Matthew Denholm, Tasmania Correspondent, The Australian, 20111109)

[Read Recovery Plan]

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Environmental jewel

The Tarkine’s wild, rugged coastline – there’s no land between this point and the South American coast – boasts some of the cleanest air in the world.  Because of these values (above ground), the Tarkine has long been the subject of a community-driven National Park proposal. In addition, in 2010, a report by the Australian Heritage Commission recommended that 430,000 hectares of the Tarkine be granted National Heritage status.

But Environment Minister Tony Burke has refused to implement this recommendation, claiming a need for further assessment and consultation. For decades, environmentalists have been working to protect the Tarkine. Some campaigns have been lost – like the road to nowhere in the mid 1990s – others have been won.  Now, with the Tasmanian Forest Agreement progressing, it looks like the area may at last be protected from logging.

.Logging and ‘scorched earthing’ of old-growth rainforest in The Tarkine

(October 2009, Environment Tasmania)

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But mining remains as a threat in this pristine region.

Savage River Open Cut Mine in the north of The Tarkine

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It’s not hard to predict what will happen over the coming months: mining companies will pressure the Tasmanian Government to allow these mines to go ahead, dressing their arguments up in the usual disguise by claiming that mining is essential for jobs.

But putting industry ahead of the environment is an approach that has failed for decades and a new approach is needed. The Wilderness Society is involved with a coalition of groups calling for the creation of a Tarkine National Park.

With your support, the Wilderness Society will be standing up for an Australia that values the Tarkine not for the metals that can be extracted by destroying it, but for the precious environmental qualities that it has when left intact.

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‘Burke’s broken promise misleads the public’

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(by Scott Jordan, Campaign Coordinator, Tarkine National Coalition, 20111202, Tasmanian Times online newspaper, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php?/weblog/article/burkes-broken-promise-misleads-the-public/)

‘Tarkine National Coalition has reacted angrily to the latest chapter in Environment Minister Tony Burke’s campaign of misinformation regarding the Tarkine National Heritage assessment.  The Minister made comment on ABC Mornings (936 Tasmania) that he did not have in his possession any report from the Australian Heritage Council supporting a permanent listing of the Tarkine.

This is at odds with our reading of the Australian Heritage Council report from September 2010 which supported the permanent listing of 433,000 hectares it had assessed as having National Heritage Values. Minister Burke has refused to publicly release this report, despite FOI requests from the ABC last year.

“The Minister is clearly failing in his responsibilities here, and is spinning mistruths to try and cover up his complicity in promoting mining in the Tarkine wilderness reserves,” said Tarkine National Coalition spokesperson Scott Jordan.

The Minister received this report two months before allowing the Tarkine’s Emergency National Heritage Listing to lapse. He then sent the AHC back to reassess the area, with a substantial budget cut and no capacity to complete the work before 2013. This will effectively shepherd up to ten new mine proposals through an EPBC process that cannot in the absence of a listing, legally consider impacts on National Heritage Values such as wilderness, rainforest, geological significance (fossil sites and karst systems), aesthetic character, Indigenous or European cultural heritage.

This mirrors the strategy applied by the Minister at the controversial Brighton By-pass in southern Tasmania and at James Price Point in northern WA, where once EPBC assessments were underway, a National Heritage Listing was applied that could have no legal effect on those ongoing assessments.

Independent advice from Andrew Macintosh, Associate Director of the ANU Centre for Climate Law and Policy confirms that the AHC report does in fact refer to a permanent listing, and advises that the AHC’s terms of reference only allow it to report on whether an area has National Heritage Values and prevents it from making ‘qualified’ or ‘preliminary’ findings. The correspondence from Mr Macintoshcan be downloaded below..

“It becomes impossible to have reasonable dealings with a Minister who won’t stick to the rules, and won’t tell the truth”.  “The Minister must immediately release the Australian Heritage Council’s Tarkine report from September 2010”.

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Emergency National Heritage Listing

The TNC and partner groups (WWF, Australian Conservation Foundation, The Wilderness Society, Tasmanian Conservation Trust, Environment Tasmania and North West Environment Centre) resubmitted a Emergency National Heritage Listing nomination last week, triggered by the threats to National Heritage Values of the Mount Lindsay and other mining proposals.

The resubmitting of the Tarkine Road proposal by the Tasmanian Government called into play a promise made by Minister Burke last December that if the Tarkine Road was resubmitted, that he would immediately re-list the Tarkine. The Minister has failed to deliver on this promise.

“The failure to reapply a Tarkine Emergency National Heritage Listing in response to the Tarkine Road referral clearly shows this Minister’s contempt for the responsibilities of his office, and clearly tells us that any promises he makes are worthless”.

“The key difference between this proposal and the former proposal is not the alterations to the route, but the fact that a mining company now needs this route for transporting product to ports”.

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‘Burke places money and mines before Tarkine’

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by Senator Christine Milne, Tasmanian Times online newspaper, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php?/weblog/article/burkes-broken-promise-misleads-the-public/]

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Federal Environment Minister, Tony Burke, must explain why he will allow the assessment of mining proposals to occur in the Tarkine before acting on advice before him to permanently heritage list the region, Australian Greens Deputy Leader, Christine Milne said today.

“Minister Burke today claimed on ABC local radio to have no information leading to the emergency heritage listing of the Tarkine, but failed to mention a report buried in his department recommending the Tarkine be listed.

“The Environment Minister is playing into the hands of mining companies, who are no doubt jubilant of the 2013 deadline given to the Australian Heritage Council to determine whether permanent heritage listing should be put in place.

“By 2013, all ten of the mining proposals will be submitted to the department and any subsequent heritage listing will have no effect on their operations. The wilderness, geological and cultural values of the Tarkine will not be assessed.

“It is like putting on a seatbelt after your car has crashed.

“Minister Burke’s job has moved from a focus on natural and heritage values to one of being solely concerned with bleeding monetary value from the places he is supposed to protect.

“Peter Garrett placed emergency heritage listing on the Tarkine following the state government’s previous attempt at building a road, and now, with a similar application before him, as well as ten mining applications that will be seriously impinged by such a listing, we have Minister Burke reneging on his promise to heritage list the region should another road proposal be made.

“This ongoing, seven year process to determine heritage listing the Tarkine has become an embarrassment to Australia whose governments persistently fail to recognise the value of this natural jewel.

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“Minister Burke has everything at his disposal for immediately placing the Tarkine on the National Heritage list.

Act now, Minister Burke, before these mines have your name all over them.”

Tasmania as seen by miners – exploitative ‘below-ground’ values

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Selected comments readers of Tasmanian Times:

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by Barnaby Drake (20111202):

“The key difference between this proposal and the former proposal is not the alterations to the route, but the fact that a mining company now needs this route for transporting product to ports”.

‘Is it not just as I predicted? All infrastructure for these mining companies will be paid for by us. Here the original estimate was for $24 Million as a starters. Expect the real cost to be dramatically understated so that they can get their approval before announcing the usual blow-out! And that’s just the start of it. That also means that the Tourism budget will take the hit, but strangely, Forestry will also be able to us this road as the Tarkine is no longer protected. It will then be discovered by TasPorts that they need to upgrade their port facilities somewhere in the West to benefit the local inhabitants and they require another Sqillion Dollars and of course, create a couple of thousand jobs, etc.

Hallelujah!   The economy has been saved. Your pensions are safe. A new mining tax will see us all happy and prosperous and MP’s will be able to have their blocked salary increases paid. A replay of the famous once Gunns proposals.

All we need now is an education bus to train the kiddies for the future.  Utopia!’

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by John Hayward  (20111202):

‘The Minister would see his responsibility as being to himself, his party, and to their major political contributors.  His apparent dishonesty, or ignorance, is merely a consequence of these priorities.’

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by Russell Langfield  (20111202):

‘Can anyone name a promise Environment Minister Burke has kept, or a decision being made which favoured the environment over business interests?’

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Salamander  (20111202):

‘Burke likes to make out he is a man of the people, and responds when he gets enough signals from the people to act for the environment. Yesterday he was complaining about the hijacking of his twitter account by tweets about the Tarkine – but still he won’t do what the people want. Seems to me we have a puppet whose strings are completely controlled by corporations.’

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by Pete Godfrey  (20111203):

‘There is no money for hospitals, police, mobile phones for police, anything that is good for people, but there is always money available for Forestry and Mining.  From what I can recall every mine venture that has received grants from the government has failed. All we ever get back is the privelege of cleaning up the mess and a hole in the ground.  Part of the Tarkine have already been destroyed comprehensively by Forestry Tasmania, it is time to protect the rest from both of these rapacious subsidy collectors.’

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by Pete Godfrey  (20111203):

‘Unless you count building a road for Mining and Logging access to the area as a grant. I do.

What will happen is that he industry will start up, then say “oh it is not viable without some subsidies” then we put our hand in the the till and hand over heaps of money. Just like all the other mining ventures on the west coast. The companies accept the money then close the mine down not long after.
You can guarantee that the government will pay in the end.
We will pay for the new “mining and forestry road”
We will upgrade port facilities.
We will pay for road damage and bridge damage. Which is what the original Tarkine loop road proposal was about, it was to rebuild two bridges that have washed away before, the Tayatea bridge being one of them.
We may not hear of incentive grants to attract the miners but you can bet that a certain minister from the west will be handing grants out like lollies.’

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Maclays Swallowtail (Graphium Macleyanum), a native to The Tarkine

 

© Photo by Marja-Liisa, Helsinki  (‘mliisa’s photostream’ on flickr, AU-2100 from Lynette,

^http://www.flickr.com/photos/25816219@N00/1921054368/

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‘If the Tarkine were to be joined to the world heritage area, a vast reserve would be created, stretching from just a few kilometres south of Tasmania’s north coast all the way to its south-western extremity.

If this were to happen, it would, in my opinion, be among the top half-dozen natural areas remaining in the world.  And properly managed, it would bring wealth to Tasmanians into the foreseeable future.’

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~ Tim Flannery, contribution in ‘The Tarkine‘ (2010), edited by Ralph Ashton, and published by Allen & Unwin.

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Corporate Tin Miner:

“We will continue to be aggressive explorers with multiple rigs focused on exploration for the foreseeable future.”

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~ Venture Minerals (corporate tin miner from Perth), in its Mt Lindsay-Investor Presentation,

(Nov 2011), p.31

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‘The Tarkine’ – 430,000 hectares of ancient Tasmanian forest

Tasmania’s ancient Myrtle/Sassafras forest – threatened by loggers, logger ‘adventure tourism’, roads and now bloody tin mining!

[Photo by Peter Walton, Tasmanian Expeditions – Photo Gallery on The Tarkine, ^http://www.tasmanianexpeditions.com.au/index.php?section=photo_highlights&id=285742]

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Cradle Coast Authority (CCA), North West Tasmania’s map

as part of a tourism development strategy.

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A bid to restore emergency National Heritage protection to the Tarkine wilderness in Tasmania’s north-west has been launched by environmentalists to head off a ”Pilbara-style” mine in the rainforest.  Several conservation groups lodged the nomination with the Environment Minister, Tony Burke, hoping he will count heritage values in his impending decision on the big Venture Minerals’ Mount Lindsay open cut project.

Emergency listings of The Tarkine have been granted four times since 2004!

 

Moss-clad Sassafras (Atherosperma moschatum) trees in the Arthur River catchment near Waratah, Tarkine, Tasmania

(Photo © Ted Mead November 2003)

[Front Cover of the 2004 book, ‘Tarkine‘ edited by Ralph Ashton, and available from publishers Allen and Unwin,and just purchased by The Habitat Advocate.

Available at: ^http://www.allenandunwin.com/default.aspx?page=94&book=9781742372846]

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…but that’s not how the ‘Tin Men‘ see The Tarkine…

This is how the ‘Tin Men‘ see the Tarkine… for its tin and tungsten.

(Source: Venture Minerals’ Mt Lindsay-Investor Presentation, Nov 2011)

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…and this is how the ‘Tin Men’ see the Tarkine… for the vast mining lease area they are happy to exploit and lay to waste.

(Source: Venture Minerals’ Mt Lindsay-Investor Presentation, Nov 2011)

 

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…and this is how the Tin Men see the Tarkine – for its ‘Super Mining Profits’ … 30 to 55% return!

(Source: Venture Minerals’ Mt Lindsay-Investor Presentation, Nov 2011)

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The Mount Lindsay tin project is the largest of several mines planned around the Tarkine in an emerging new Tasmanian environmental battle. The Tarkine National Coalition said up to nine new open cut mines are in development there.   Mr Burke allowed a previous emergency listing for the Tarkine to lapse a year ago when he said plans for a road through the wilderness were dropped.  Environment groups objected because of what they said were increasing threats from mining.

Corporate Miner ‘Metals X’ getting well stuck into a Tarkine rainforest hillside at nearby Mount Bischoff

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The 430,000-hectare Tarkine region is undergoing a protracted assessment for future listing by the Australian Heritage Council. But because the wilderness now lacks any listing, Mr Burke is unable to consider heritage values in an approval of the Mount Lindsay mine under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.  Instead, his decision is likely to focus on protection of endangered species such as the Tasmanian Devil.  The Tarkine is the wildest remaining stronghold for healthy devils, stricken across the rest of the island by a deadly facial cancer.

The Tarkine is a refuge for healthy Tasmanian Devils to avoid the genocidal tumour disease

 

..but what could heartless commercial ‘Tin Men’ care?

Think of the ‘Super Mining Profits’ … 30 to 55% return!

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The Tarkine National Coalition spokesman Scott Jordan said yesterday:

”Companies, including Venture, are using the removal of the heritage protections to ramp up exploration activities including roading and drilling that are having a significant effect on the values of the area.”

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The coalition was joined by the  World Wildlife Fund, the Australian Conservation Foundation and The Wilderness Society in seeking the listing. An Australian National University environmental law specialist, Andrew Macintosh, said emergency listings had been granted four times since 2004, but Mr Burke was not compelled to respond to the request.  In a statement, Mr Burke did not respond directly to the emergency listing request, but said he would continue meeting with different groups on issues surrounding the heritage listing of the Tarkine.  [Editor’s note:  in fact there has been one emergency National Heritage listing (Dec 2009 – Dec 2010), one National Heritage nomination (2004), three emergency National Heritage nominations (Nov 2009, Mar 2011 and Nov 2011), and two AHC recommendations (2003 and Sep 2010)… so what’s it bloody take to get the message through?]

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[Source: ‘Call for heritage listing of the Tarkine to head off tin mine‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 20111119, ^http://www.smh.com.au/national/call-for-heritage-listing-of-the-tarkine-to-
head-off-tin-mine-20111118-1nndq.html]

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‘Jobs, jobs, jobs’ justification – but all for mainlanders, foreigners and short-termers

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Typically, this miner (Venture Minerals) relies on the standard jobs justification to exploit, dig up, pollute and destroy the Tarkine Wilderness for tin. Venture Mineral is promising 700 jobs!   But of those , 500 jobs involve construction – so short term fly ins from the mainland and overseas only during construction phase.  The remaining 200 jobs are promised for the mine’s operations.   But miners don’t train locals.  This is not about Tasmanian jobs.  These 200 jobs will be sourced from similar mines on the mainland and indeed from overseas all on on Federal Labor’s 457 Visa (Australian worker displacement) Scheme. Just look at OZ Minerals at Rosebery.

457 Visas:  ‘..for employers who would like to employ overseas workers to fill nominated skilled positions in Australia, to employ overseas workers for a period of between one day and four years.’

[Source:  ^http://www.immi.gov.au/skilled/skilled-workers/sbs/]

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Venture Minerals is Perth-based at 181 Roberts Road Subiaco, another West Australian corporate miner exploiting Tasmania and taking the profits offshore.  Venture Minerals forecasts $1 billion in revenue but it won’t go to Tasmanians. It will go back to West Australia and to its rich mine shareholders.  Typically mining is eco-rape, pillage and plunder – wam, bam, thank you mam, then pissing off back to where one came, leaving another tin moonscape like Mount Bischoff.

Look at the mining legacies across Tasmania left as moonscapes:

Nearby Mount Bischoff Tin Mine – wam, bam, thank you mam!

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• Kara Mine in Hampshire
• Mount Lyle’s sulphuric moonscape
• Henty Mine
• Briseis Mine at Derby
• Pioneer Mine on Bradshaws Creek
• Anchor Mine on Blue Tier
• Gladstone Mine
• Coles Bay Mine
• Ben Lomond Mine
• St Paul’s River Mine
• Flinders Island Mines
• Mount Heemskirk
• Mount Balfour
• Renison Bell
• Stanley River
• Mount Cleveland
• Cox Bight
• Melaleuca
• etc

And of course the Tasmanian Minerals Council backs mining in The Tarkine.  And of course it opposes national heritage listing of the Tarkine.  The Tasmanian Minerals Council is only about the financial bottom line, exploitation of ore and perpetuating its own existence.

The Tasmanian Minerals Council claims that there are “already enough layers of protection across the Tarkine region, where about 80% of the land has been put in multiple use reserves that allow mining“.

What ‘layers of protection’?  If 80% of the Tarkine is reserved form mining, how can that be for protection?  – for protection of mining profits and royalties perhaps.

So Tony Burke, if you’re not to pre-occupied with resolving the future of the Murray-Darling, what time are you allocating for Tasmania’s ancient Myrtle forests?

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‘Tasmania’s Tarkine wilderness is one of the world’s largest temperate rainforests.

This vast expanse is a wilderness wonderland of wild rivers, dramatic coastal heathlands, button grass plains, bare mountains, ancient Huon pines, giant eucalypts and myrtles and extraordinary horizontal scrub.

It is home to rare and endangered birds – like the Orange-bellied parrot and the White goshawk – and countless animals such as the Eastern pygmy possum. This superbly illustrated book captures the beauty of this unique wilderness.’

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[Source:  ^http://www.andrewisles.com/all-stock/publication/tarkine]

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 Orange-bellied Parrot

‘Here at Melaleuca, six days’ walk from the nearest road,

such moments of peace are typically broken by bird calls,

including the distinct buzzing of the orange-bellied parrot’.

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[Source:  ‘Scientists Race To Rebuild Parrot Population’, by Peter Ker, Sydney Morning Herald, 20110207, ^http://www.globalanimal.org/2011/02/07/scientists-race-to-rebuild-parrot-population/29032/]

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Current status:

‘The Orange-bellied parrot (Neophema chrysogaster) is one of 18 birds listed as endangered under the Tasmanian Threatened Species Protection Act 1995. It is also listed as endangered under the Federal Act and has the dubious honour of being one of the most endangered birds Australia wide.
Why is it endangered? The Orange-bellied parrot is endangered because it is so rare (only 200 birds left) and its habitat is quickly disappearing.

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There are only about 50 breeding pairs of this bird left!

..but what could heartless commercial ‘Tin Men’ care?

Think of the ‘Super Mining Profits’ … 30 to 55% return!

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‘…It is a breeding endemic of Tasmania, which means that it only breeds in Tasmania. In fact it only breeds in one place in Tasmania and that is in our Southwest National Park. It arrives here in summer, nesting in eucalypt tree hollows adjacent to the parrot’s feeding grounds of extensive coastal buttongrass plains.’

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[Source: http://www.dpiw.tas.gov.au/inter.nsf/webpages/bhan-54g3c5?open]

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