Campaigners warn of ‘disturbing trend’ of proposed mines falling just below the threshold requiring environmental impact statement.
More than 1,000 hectares of koala habitat – as well as 70 hectares of greater glider habitat – would be cleared to dig coal under a new mine being proposed in central Queensland.
Despite both marsupials being recently listed as endangered due to habitat loss, the proposed mine, which is currently under consideration by the state government, does not require an environmental impact statement (EIS).
Vitrinite’s proposed Vulcan South project is the latest in what environmental campaigners describe as a “disturbing trend” of coalmines being proposed that fall fractionally below the thresholds that trigger the EIS process.
At Vulcan South, Vitrinite proposes to produce 1.95m tonnes of coal every year, below the 2m tonne threshold that would require the company to prepare an EIS.
Vitrinite already has approval for an adjacent mine, Vulcan, that will also produce 1.95m tonnes a year. That mine is clearing more than 200ha of koala habitat and was approved by former Coalition federal government in March.
The company said it would “conservatively offset the affected habitat” from the Vulcan South site in a “managed offset area specifically focused on koala habitat conservation”, and that the project would have limited long-term impacts on koala populations
Prof David Lindenmayer, an Australian National University ecologist, said allowing the habitat of endangered species to be destroyed “made a mockery” of environmental protections.
“What’s the point of uplisting a species to endangered if you’re then going to just allow more and more habitat for that species to be cleared?” he said.
Lindenmayer said a piecemeal approach to environmental approval, in which projects were assessed in isolation, amounted to a system that threatened to make Australia the “extinction capital of the planet”.
By Joe Hinchliffe, Tue 19 Jul 2022 13.59 AEST