Plibersek greenlights new coal mine for first time, sparking fossil fuel backlash

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has for the first time granted approval for a new coal mine, sparking accusations from conservation groups that the government is fuelling global warming.

Plibersek last night signed off the final environmental approvals for Australian miner Bowen Coking Coal’s Isaac River project, a relatively small mine in Central Queensland with a short, five-year lifespan producing steel-making coal for export.

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has rejected coal mine applications previously but approved one in Queensland on Thursday night.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

She said there were no grounds to reject the company’s development application, which must be considered on a case-by-case basis and not for its cumulative contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.

“The Albanese government has to make decisions in accordance with the facts and the national environment law – that’s what happens on every project, and that’s what’s happened here,” she said.

The federal environment minister has the final say, under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act, over major projects that will impact matters of national environmental significance such as endangered plants and animals as well as World Heritage areas and national parks.

Greens environment spokesperson Sarah Hanson-Young said the act was broken. She is calling for a new “climate trigger” law that would add climate change to the list of issues governments must consider.

“Polluting projects are failing to be assessed for the emissions they create. We desperately need a climate trigger which will stop new coal and gas in its tracks,” she said.

The Climate Council demanded that Plibersek reject the mine for its greenhouse emissions and the Move Beyond Coal movement called a snap rally outside her electoral office in Sydney’s Redfern on Friday.

“We cannot have new, highly polluting coal as we’re living through the age of climate consequences,” Climate Council head of advocacy Jennifer Rayner said.

Environmental Justice Australia, representing the Environment Council of Central Queensland, has launched legal action to force the government to reject 19 coal and gas proposals because of their global warming potential.

The government has argued that to reject a specific project, it must be proved that it would cause substantial damage to a matter of national environmental significance from climate change.

Environment Council of Central Queensland president Christine Carlisle said Plibersek’s decision to approve the Isaac River mine meant she “joins a long line of federal environment ministers who have said it’s not their job to consider the climate risk of new coal and gas mines”.

In February , Plibersek vetoed Clive Palmer’s coal mine proposal in the Great Barrier Reef catchment because its impact on the water catchment in the World Heritage area would have been too damaging.

Last week, she cancelled the development applications of two proposed coal projects in Queensland because they had lapsed after sitting incomplete on the register for nine and 12 years respectively.

Bowen Coking Coal executive chairman Nick Jorss said the mine would export coal to developing nations, where demand for steel was growing.

“We are confident that world steel and energy demand will continue its rapid growth, driven by ongoing industrialisation in the developing world and the drive for decarbonisation in the developed world.”

Wilderness Society manager of policy and strategy Tim Beshara said the Albanese government had not done anything to halt land clearing, one of the two biggest drivers of extinctions along with feral pests, since it assumed office.

“We have wall-to-wall Labor governments across the mainland but there hasn’t been public expression calling on any state government to lift their game,” he said.

“There isn’t an endangered species, from the Greater Glider to the sawfish of the Kimberley, that would be able to notice that the government has changed. Times like this, when the deforestation record of a state like Queensland is brought into public view, is exactly when national leadership is so important.”

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