THE GREAT BARRIER REEF IN DANGER

The health of the World Heritage listed Great Barrier Reef is often in the news.  For years there has been recognition that its health is threatened by declining water quality as a result of land-clearing, agricultural run-off and the construction of large ports along the coastline as well as the spread of pests such as the crown of thorns starfish.

While water quality continues to be a major issue despite attempts to remediate the problem, climate change has now been recognised as the major threat to the Reef’s existence.

Researcher Ove Hoegh-Guldberg established the link between coral bleaching and climate change in the late 1990s.  When the water gets too hot, the corals expel the microscopic algae that give them colour (zooxanthellae) and bleach.  Eventually they will die.

While this link was disputed vigorously by climate denialists as well as fossil fuel interests opposed to effective action on climate change, the increasingly frequent bleaching events in recent years have shown just how sensitive corals are to temperature rises.

While the Federal Government claims to be taking the threat of climate to the Reef more seriously, it is still failing to take effective action on climate change.

Last month Federal Environment Minister Sussan  Ley  learnt UNESCO had made a draft decision to put the Great Barrier Reef on the “in danger” list.  She claimed the government had been “blindsided”, that the draft decision was “a deviation from normal process” and that it had been based on a “desktop review”. 

Australian scientists refuted her assertions stating that the Government should not have been surprised by the UNESCO scientists’ draft decision which will go to a meeting of the World Heritage Committee in a few weeks. 

Professor Terry Hughes, a coral studies researcher at James Cook University, stated that the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the scientific body which advises UNESCO, produced a report last year which listed the reef’s status as “critical”. 

The dire state of the reef is another indicator that the Federal Government should urgently adopt an effective climate policy.

            - Leonie Blain

Published in the "Voices for the Earth" column in The Clarence Valley Independent , July 14, 2021.

DEFORESTATION AND THE GREAT BARRIER REEF

Since 2000, Australia's Great Barrier Reef has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. In short it is dying, a condition some scientists claim is terminal.

In the face of worldwide condemnation, the Federal and Queensland Governments are now claiming to be doing all in their power to ensure the reef's survival, pouring billions of dollars into various schemes to resurrect the tourist icon.

These belated moves can only be viewed with cynicism, given both governments' abject failure to address the two main threats facing the reef - climate change and pollution. Not only have they failed to act, they are actively encouraging the mining and use of fossil fuels, and on-going land-clearing, both of which drive climate change.

Figures from the latest national emissions accounts show that forests adjacent to the reef, covering 770,000 ha, three times the size of the ACT, have been bulldozed over the past five years, with 152,000 ha felled in 2016-17.

The previous Queensland government approved the clearing of 2,000 ha of forest at Kingvale Station on Cape York, which is expected to receive Federal Government blessing shortly, leading the Wilderness Society to liken Australia's deforestation record to that of the Amazon and Indonesia.

Deforestation increases nutrient and sediment run-off, factors that lower water quality, stimulate algae growth and smother corals, and is also contributing to global warming. All these facts are known to the government, yet still they allow land-clearing to continue, and in a move that should infuriate tax-payers, is planning to spend millions of dollars to help those land-clearing organisations to manage the sediment run-off.

The lunacy doesn't stop there. More than $1billion from Tony Abbott’s Direct Action policy, the Emissions Reduction Fund, has been spent on tree-planting and habitat restoration. However, analysis of the latest government data revealed those emissions savings were wiped out elsewhere in the country by deforestation in a little over two years

The flat-out refusal by the current federal government to make any meaningful attempt to rein in greenhouse gas emissions for fear of upsetting their extremist far right colleagues is unforgivable.

- John Edwards

This article was originally published in the VOICES FOR THE EARTH column in The Daily Examiner on October 15, 2018. 

AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENTS AND THE ADANI COAL MINE

Adani’s proposed Carmichael coal mine in Queensland’s Galilee Basin is frequently in the news for the very good reason that it is a very controversial development.

The Federal and Queensland Governments are both in favour of it because they claim it will have enormous economic benefits. 

Despite this governmental enthusiasm, community opposition continues to grow for a variety of reasons. Firstly there is the environmental impact that this mine will have both in its immediate area as well as globally.  

With a proposed annual extraction of 60 million tonnes per year it will be the largest coal mine in the world. So the carbon emissions generated from the coal’s extraction and combustion will have a very significant impact on the world’s climate. Those concerned about the accelerating rate of climate change argue that this mine will have an unacceptable impact on the world’s climate. They believe new coal mines should not be opened and that existing mines need to be systematically closed down unless they are essential for specific industries such as steel production.

This mine will also have an impact on the Great Barrier Reef.

The Great Barrier Reef (GBR), which runs for 2,300 km along the Queensland coast and covers an area of approximately 344,400 sq. km, is under threat from climate change and a variety of other impacts including port development and coal spills. As well as being an incredible natural wonder, the Reef is a major tourist attraction.  So it is a very significant earner for the Queensland and Australian economies as  more than two million people visit it each year generating earnings of more than $2 billion. .  Moreover, it is a major employer with more than 60,000 people employed in Reef tourism.

Last year there was a major bleaching event on the Reef.  This year there has been another.  Two such major events in consecutive years was formerly unprecedented. These events have highlighted how vulnerable coral reefs are to the warming seas produced by climate change. So concern about the Reef is another very strong reason for opposition to this mine and to the other mega-mines that are on the drawing board for the Galilee Basin.

Although some supporters claim up to 10,000 jobs would be generated by the mine, Adani’s consultants put the figure at less than 1,500 full time jobs. 

While the Queensland and Federal Governments talk up the job prospects from the Carmichael mine, they ignore the importance of the many thousands of tourist jobs reliant on a healthy Great Barrier Reef, a Reef that is currently under threat from the impacts of climate change.

Other claimed economic benefits are also questionable.  Given the world-wide move away from coal to renewables there is a strong likelihood (actually a certainty according to many analysts) that this project, which theoretically would have a life of 60 years, will become a stranded asset. That is one of the reasons Adani is having difficulty in sourcing investment capital.

What is really astounding is, given the likelihood that this will become a stranded asset, the Federal Government is considering giving Adani a loan of almost $1 billion of taxpayers’ money to build a rail line from the Galilee Basin to the coal port at Abbot Point 25 km north of Bowen.  The loan would be obtained from the $5 billion Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund (NAIF) a fund which has recently been criticised in relation to governance issues. 

QUEENSLAND GOVERNMENT PUSHING FOR ADANI'S CARMICHAEL COAL MINE IN THE GALILEE BASIN

The proposed Carmichael coal mine in central Queensland’s Galilee Basin has recently been given a boost by the Queensland Government which has declared it ‘critical infrastructure’.  This designation means fast tracking the remaining project approvals and removing  the power of the community to challenge it in court as well as enabling the company to forcibly acquire land.

The last time this designation was given to a development in Queensland was in 2008 when parts of the South East Queensland Water Grid were declared critical infrastructure because water supplies in this heavily populated area were at critically low levels because of drought. There’s a great deal of difference between the critical infrastructure of a water supply grid and a massive coal mine!

The mine, proposed by Indian company Adani, gained most of the necessary state and federal approvals in 2014.  However, the project is controversial and has been subject to a number of court challenges.

Two concerns encouraging opponents to undertake court challenges are the threat the mine and its associated port developments (at Abbot Point, 25 km north of Bowen) pose to the Great Barrier Reef and to groundwater in the Basin. 

Another major concern is the carbon emissions this project will see released into the atmosphere at a time when the world should be drastically cutting its emissions. When peak production is reached, Adani expects to mine 60 million tonnes of coal per year.  Over its estimated 60 year life it expects 2.3 billion tonnes to be extracted. Whether the mine, if it goes ahead, will have a life of 60 years is problematic, given moves around the world to limit coal production, moves which are likely to become more influential in future years as concern rises about the necessity of limiting emissions to combat climate change.

There are other concerns in relation to Adani. These involve corruption, illegal activity, human rights abuses, tax evasion and environmental destruction

 (1. The Sydney Morning Herald 3 October 2015 -   Adani faces questions over conduct at home 

  2.  Times of India 13 September 2016  - Adani, Essar get DRI notice for overvaluing imports

  3.  The Sydney Morning Herald 5 September 2014 - Concerns at Barrier Reef contractor's humanitarian, environment record  )

While the unsuccessful court challenges may have slowed Adani’s start, another major problem has been its inability to obtain project funding - the result of a very successful lobbying campaign targeting major banks and other financial sources.

The Queensland Government’s recent encouragement stems from concerns about job losses in central Queensland following the general mining downturn in the last year or so.  The Government appears to believe the original company spiel of 10,000 jobs - even though Adani’s own economic expert recently put the job number at 1464.

The Queensland Mines Minister Anthony Lynham sees the project starting construction in mid  to late 2017.

The Queensland Government should be looking at the big picture.  This is not a time when governments should be encouraging the development of new coal mines - particularly  one as large as this.  Those opposing the mine are concerned that if all the coal from Carmichael was burned, it would register on a global scale - amounting to about 0.5% of the "budget" of carbon dioxide that can be emitted before the world tips past global warming of 2 degrees celsius.

As well as the climate change scenario, the  Government - anxious as it apparently is about jobs - should be considering  the 69,000 Barrier Reef tourism jobs that will be put at risk by this mine.