Former CS Energy chair Jim Soorley unaware of warnings at ‘catastrophic’ power station

The former chair of state-owned CS Energy Jim Soorley has claimed he was unaware of management warnings a Queensland power station was at risk of a ‘catastrophic’ incident, a court has heard.

Former CS Energy chair Jim Soorley outside the Federal Court in Brisbane on Thursday, Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen

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The former chair of state-owned CS Energy Jim Soorley has claimed he was unaware of management warnings a Queensland power station was at risk of a “catastrophic” incident because he says he didn’t get involved in the operation of the facility that later exploded.

The former Brisbane Labor mayor and CS Energy chair from 2015 – when he was appointed by then premier Annastacia Palaszczuk – until 2023, also told a Federal Court on Thursday he had not read a report into the ­explosion because “it has nothing to do with me”.

The explosion at the Callide C station in May 2021 cut off power to 500,000 homes and, according to a subsequent report by the Queensland Competition Authority, led to a spike in wholesale electricity prices caused by the ­reduced supply.

“I’d left the business (by the time the report was released) and I had other things to do,’’ Mr Soorley said when asked why he hadn’t read the report.

“I didn’t know that I was going to be dragged here (the Federal Court) and even when I knew I was going to be dragged here, I had made a conscious decision not to read it,” Mr Soorley said.

The final report by forensic engineer Sean Brady, released in July, made damning findings that a lack of funding for both maintenance and the rollout of a process safety program was behind the failure of the massive power station in central Queensland.

Dr Brady was also critical of the level of expertise on the CS Energy board that was needed to run power stations.

Callide, which is operated and half-owned by the Queensland government’s CS Energy in a joint venture with Czech and Chinese investors, is facing separate court action by the federal electricity regulator over its alleged failure to meet statutory obligations for maintenance work on the facility.

Mr Soorley was called to give evidence at a hearing of the special purpose administrator, FTI Consulting, of the joint venture company which is enquiring into the cause of the explosion

After the release of a draft of the Brady report, Miles government Energy Minister Mick de Brenni accused Mr Soorley and former CS Energy chief executive Andrew Bills of misleading him about the maintenance backlogs.

“What I was told was that all of their statutory and other maintenance that was required to be done was done,” he said. “The CEO and the chair told me that.”

On Thursday, Mr Soorley was not asked about Mr de Brenni’s comments. But the veteran Labor figure was grilled on whether he was aware of the 2019 resignation of the head of Callide’s process safety program Lara Kayess, citing a lack of funding for her team and the maintenance backlogs.

The court has previously heard that during Ms Kayess’s exit interview she said “Callide was on a path of catastrophic risk”. She told CS Energy the lack of maintenance, pushing out overhaul dates and four fires in five months were “telltale signs” a safety incident was “quite possible”.

The court heard after Ms Kayess resigned, her deputy also quit and that there was no process safety management team at Callide between April 2019 and July 2020.

But Mr Soorley, who said he had a declared passion for safety at CS Energy, said he was not aware of the problems with the team. “No (he wasn’t aware), it’s an operational issue, and I did not get involved in the operation,’’ he said, adding he couldn’t recall if he knew of Ms Kayess’ resignation or the warnings she gave at the exit interview.

“What is said at the exit interview of staff from CS Energy has nothing to do with the chairman,’’ he said.