Environment Minister Plibersek has approved three thermal coal mine expansions that will supercharge climate change by locking in about 1.5 billion tonnes of lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions. This is more than three times Australia’s total annual emissions.

The move comes just a week after the Albanese Government refused to discuss amending the country’s national environment law to consider the damage of climate change when making decisions about new and expanding coal mines. 

The Narrabri Underground coal expansion approval extends to 2066 and will clear 457 hectares of habitat for the endangered koala in the Pilliga Forest, while undermining a key recharge zone of the Great Artesian Basin and draining farm water bores.

The Mount Pleasant Optimisation Project is a huge expansion of an open cut mine on the doorstep of the Hunter Valley town of Muswellbrook. It will clear the habitat of a legless lizard listed as endangered earlier this year, and which lives only in the Hunter region. 

The Ashton-Ravensworth decision re-approves the exploitation of around 40 million tonnes of coal at the closed Ravensworth underground mine in the central Hunter Valley which would otherwise not have been mined. 

Lock the Gate Alliance spokesperson Carmel Flint said, “Through these decisions, the Albanese Government has revealed its reckless disregard for the extinction of Australian wildlife and the effects of catastrophic climate change on all Australians. 

“We are shocked that a government that came to power promising to halt extinction and act on climate change has sunk so low. 

“It is shameful that a government supposedly committed to net zero emissions by 2050 has approved thermal coal mines, the most polluting fossil fuel on the planet, to operate until 2058, 2064 and 2066. Australians will pay the price of this decision for generations to come. 

“Minister Plibersek is holding a so-called ‘Global Nature Positive’ Conference in just two weeks in Sydney, but she’s sent nature into a devastating negative spiral with these three approvals."

Gomeroi Traditional Owner Karra Kinchella, whose country includes the Pilliga Forest, said, “The Pilliga Forest and the water that runs through and beneath it is sacred to Gomeroi.

“Tanya Plibersek’s decision to approve Whitehaven’s destructive Narrabri coal mine expansion is an insult to us and our ancestors. 

“The world was shocked and saddened when Notre-Dame went up in flames. Well Tanya Plibersek has just given Whitehaven permission to put the blowtorch to our church.”

Boggabri farmer Sally Hunter said, “Whitehaven's documents say at least nine water bores on surrounding farms will go dry. These water impacts cannot ever be undone.  

“This will essentially sterilise a whole swathe of farmland. The mine will be long gone but the water depletion will remain.  

“At a time when food security is getting ever so important and farmland and water should be protected, Tanya Plibersek is sacrificing precious groundwater so multibillion dollar coal companies can export fossil fuels for decades to come.  

“This is a bloody disgrace.”