Queensland government investigating Adani again, about coal terminal water release
Key points:
- Adani has not applied for an emergency water release permit for Abbot Point
- Water flowed into Caley Valley wetlands this month after monsoonal rain
- The Queensland Government is prosecuting Adani over a 2017 wetland water release
It comes as Adani revealed it did not apply for an emergency permit to dump more polluted water into the sensitive Caley Valley wetlands during the north Queensland floods last week.
The company told the ABC that Abbot Point operators were confident they could manage floodwaters with new infrastructure, but were then overwhelmed by flows from neighbouring properties.
Adani’s own testing showed water released into the wetlands on February 7 had almost double the authorised concentration of “suspended solids”, which included coal sediment……….
‘2017 release eight times over limit’Adani is fighting a prosecution by the department over its 2017 release of coal-laden water from the port during Cyclone Debbie.
The department alleges Adani breached a temporary emissions licence (TEL) by dumping water with more than 800mg/L — eight times the authorised concentration of suspended solids……….
Conservationists called on the Queensland Government to launch a second prosecution of Adani over Abbot Point.
Australian Marine Conservation Society campaigner Lissa Schindler said the company had “shown that it cannot be trusted with our precious reef”.
She criticised Adani’s advertising campaign designed to pressure the government into granting final approvals of its Carmichael coal project.
Ms Schindler said Adani instead “should have been ensuring its port was able to cope with Queensland’s extreme weather events”.
Mackay Conservation Group campaigner Peter McCallum said: “If you own and operate a port in Queensland on our precious Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, you must make sure it can withstand big storms.” https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-13/adani-facing-government-probe-abbot-point-wetland-release/10805206
Heated exchange at Adani media event
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/heated-exchange-at-adani-media-event A press conference to showcase the support of indigenous traditional owners for Adani’s Carmichael coal mine has served to show divided opinions on the project.
A fiery war of words has broken out at a press conference designed to highlight the support of Indigenous traditional owners for Adani’s controversial Carmichael coal mine.
Spokesman for the Wangan and Jagalingou people of central Queensland, Patrick Malone, spoke up about the benefits of the project, including a boost to local employment alongside Resources Minister Matt Canavan at Parliament House in Canberra on Tuesday.
He stressed that traditional owners voted 294-to-1 in favour of establishing a land use agreement with Adani in 2016.
They did that because there are long-term benefits for Wangan and Jagalingou people,” Mr Malone told reporters.
But he was soon interrupted by fellow Wangan and Jagalingou representative Murrawah Johnson.
“Not appropriate,” Ms Johnson declared upon arriving at the scene.
Ms Johnson accused Mr Malone of having no right to represent her people, because of a native title claim still in dispute.
But Mr Malone rejected the view, lamenting that “loud mouth people” were overshadowing the majority view of traditional owners.
“Look after country,” Ms Johnson urged Mr Malone.
I know all about that,” he replied.
With the exchange showing no signs of cooling down, Senator Canavan swiftly wrapped up the conference, with security arriving to usher away the interrupters. They did that because there are long-term benefits for Wangan and Jagalingou people,” Mr Malone told reporters.
But he was soon interrupted by fellow Wangan and Jagalingou representative Murrawah Johnson.
“Not appropriate,” Ms Johnson declared upon arriving at the scene.
Ms Johnson accused Mr Malone of having no right to represent her people, because of a native title claim still in dispute.
But Mr Malone rejected the view, lamenting that “loud mouth people” were overshadowing the majority view of traditional owners.
“Look after country,” Ms Johnson urged Mr Malone.
“I know all about that,” he replied.
With the exchange showing no signs of cooling down, Senator Canavan swiftly wrapped up the conference, with security arriving to usher away the interrupters.
Australia and water: the driest inhabited continent in the age of climate change
Australia is the canary, and the coalmine, for the world when it comes to water stress, 
Guardian, R Keller Kopf , 11 Feb 19,
As extreme climate events happen around the world, Australian 
communities are running out of water
“The skies are brass and the plains are bare,
Death and ruin are everywhere—
And all that is left of the last year’s flood
Is a sickly stream on the grey-black mud;
The salt-springs bubble and the quagmires quiver,
And this is the dirge of the Darling River.”
— Henry Lawson (1891)
The northern hemisphere faced a polar vortex, while Australia during December and January was the hottest on record. People and the environment are suffering at both ends of the planet because of the extreme events.
Australia’s heatwave has exposed cracks in our unsustainable water, land-use and climate policies.
Fish kills in the Darling River, followed by more in other waterways, are being blamed on drought. More than one million fish died following multiple events in December and January.
The public has been aghast. The catalyst for outrage has been viral videos of hundreds of Murray cod floating dead and being displayed by angry locals. Murray cod is an icon of Australian waterways and one of the world’s largest species of freshwater fish. The biggest Murray cod – allegedly 114kg – was caught in 1902, during the federation drought in a tributary of the Darling, near Walgett.
But extreme conditions and fish kills are natural here in the “land of drought and flooding rains”, right?
The Darling is the longest river on the driest inhabited continent – prone to harsh and variable conditions. Lawson’s 1891 poem, which followed one year after the largest flood, is used often to depict the naturally occurring extreme conditions of our rivers. Indeed, European explorers who set off to chart flows to the “great inland sea” were surprised instead to discover a drought-stricken river – the Darling. Though the water was too salty to drink, it abounded with pelicans, swans, ducks and leaping fish.
Heatwaves and drought have always occurred here but unsustainable levels of water extraction and climate change are much more recent. Vast quantities of water are now extracted and used, during drought and flood, to irrigate crops including rice and cotton.
The amount of water used for irrigated agriculture varies, but ranged from about 50% of all flows in the Murray during the 1980s and 90s, to more than 76% during the Millennium Drought. Standards for healthy rivers are debated, but extraction of more than 20% of flows typically results in adverse changes to biodiversity and the benefits people derive from clean water.
Worldwide the demand for fresh water is expected to increase by 55% by 2050.
Australia is experiencing this water stress now. We are thus a canary, and the coalmine, for the rest of the world………..
There is plenty of water to go around for people and the environment, but not enough to simultaneously sustain the current irrigation entitlements.
Banning cotton and rice and degrading farmers will not solve the problem.
What will solve it is reducing total water entitlements for irrigation and increasing flows for rivers and wetlands.
Environmental flows have expanded in many regions, but the Darling and northern-basin still seem to be a wild west of water extraction. Minimum environmental flow standards have either not been in place or have been insufficient to sustain dry-land rivers. Minimum flow standards and policies around land use and run-off must be sufficiently robust to prevent further large-scale blue-green algae events, which are the proximate causes of the current hypoxia and fish kills.
The best available science reviewed by the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists has recommend an increase in environmental flows, to a minimum of 3,200 GL per year to maintain healthy freshwater ecosystems.
So, what can the world learn from our experience on the driest inhabited continent?……….
Subsidies that perpetuate the – hydro-illogical – cycle of unsustainable irrigation around the world should stop being funded. Instead, funding for communities must be targeted at helping farmers adapt and growing industries that will be viable during water scarcity, climate change and extreme conditions. Regional communities and freshwater ecosystems are much more than irrigation ditches and will thrive if presented with new opportunities.
If global carbon emissions remain high, the 48.3C record temperature in Bourke, situated near the Darling River, a few weeks ago should be expected to become 50C or 51C by 2090. Temperatures in Death Valley are sometimes that hot, but then again no one is growing cotton or cod there.
This does not have to be the dirge of the Darling, regional communities or farming. But it is time for change.
- R Keller Kopf is a freshwater ecologist at Charles Sturt University. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/11/australia-is-the-canary-and-the-coal-mine-for-the-world-when-it-comes-to-water-stress
Adani ramps up propaganda war, intimidation of activists
Nuclear Engineering company Frazer Nash increasing its pro nuclear lobbying in Australia
“Since opening its first Australian office in 2010 Frazer-Nash has supported high-profile South Australian projects including ……. the Federal Government’s initiative to develop a low level radioactive waste disposal facility, …..”
https://www.fncaustralia.com.au/…/south-australia-premier-o…
Extreme weather in Australia – the economic effects : why we need to prepare for this
Storm-o-nomics: Why Australia should be more prepared for extreme weather, The Conversation, By Matt WadeFebruary 9, 2019 Another Australian summer has been marked by disasters triggered by extreme weather. Some came out of the blue, like the Townsville floods. Others unfolded gradually, like the droughtafflicting much of eastern Australia.
But there’s one characteristic our natural disasters have in common: their high price tag when compared with the rest of the world.
The World Disasters Report 2018, prepared by the Red Cross, found Australia was ranked 10th in the world for the cost of damage caused by disasters between 2008 and 2017. It estimated our disaster damage bill over that decade to be a hefty $US27 billion ($38 billion).
A separate study by London-based charity Christian Aid rated Australia’s lingering drought as the world’s seventh most costly weather-related disaster of 2018 (between US$5.8 and $9 billion).
We’re also located in world’s most disaster-prone region. The Asia Pacific was hit by two out of every five of the 335 disasters recorded worldwide in 2017 and suffered 58 per cent of disaster-related deaths, according to the Red Cross.
The headlines typically focus on the insurance losses caused by property damage following a calamity like the Townsville floods.
A recent report by consultancy SGS Economics and Planning for insurance company IAG tallied the insurance losses in Australia due to natural perils between 1970 and 2013.
During those decades storms caused the greatest losses (27 per cent of the total) followed by hail damage (21 per cent), floods (18 per cent), tropical cyclones (18 per cent) and bushfires (10 per cent).
But there’s a difference between insurance losses due to extreme weather and the broader economic cost. Insurance losses following natural disasters only capture the losses accruing to insured assets such as homes, motor vehicles and business premises. That’s only part of the story.
The disruption caused by disasters changes the way businesses and consumers behave, sometimes for an extended period, causing losses to production that never show up in insurance claims. ……….
Professor Frank Jotzo, director of the Centre for Climate Economics and Policy at the Australian National University, says climate science shows Australians should expect more frequent, and more intense, extreme weather events due to climate change. He warns the effects of climate change will drag on the economy in two ways.
First, the destruction caused by more frequent extreme weather events, especially to public infrastructure, will require capital and labour to be diverted to rebuilding things we already have rather than creating new productive assets.
“It means we have to invest resources in things that don’t give us an additional economic output,” says Professor Jotzo.
Second, climate change will take a toll on productivity. One obvious example is the impact higher average temperatures and shifting rainfall patterns will have on agricultural production.
The health of employees, especially in cities, will be affected by more frequent and long-lasting heatwaves and that means more work days lost to illness.
“Heatwaves mean people are under greater stress and more prone to ill-health,” says Jotzo. “That’s a direct hit on the economy.”………..
So what can be done?
Rawnsley’s analysis shows governments have focused too much on post-disaster reconstruction while investing too little in mitigation.
“Out of ever $100 spent on disasters about $97 is spent post the disaster,” he says.
The upshot? A disaster-prone nation like Australia should be doing more to mitigate the effects of extreme weather. https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/the-economy/storm-o-nomics-why-australia-should-be-more-prepared-for-extreme-weather-20190208-p50wln.html
Psychological aspects of the fact that climate change has arrived in Australia
The climate crisis has arrived – so stop feeling guilty and start imagining your future The Conversation, The Conversation Principal Lecturer in Psychology, University of Brighton February 7, 2019
Evidence of the devastating impacts of anthropogenic climate change are stacking up, and it is becoming horrifyingly real. There can be no doubt that the climate crisis has arrived. Yet another “shocking new study” led The Guardian and various other news media this week. One-third of Himalayan ice cap, they report, is doomed.
Meanwhile in Australia, record summer temperatures have wrought unprecedented devastation of biblical proportions – mass deaths of horses, bats and fish are reported across the country, while the island state of Tasmania burns. In some places this version of summer is a terrifying new normal.
The climate disaster future is increasingly becoming the present – and, as the evidence piles up, it is tempting to ask questions about its likely public reception. Numerous psychological perspectives suggest that if we have already invested energy in denying the reality of a situation we experience as profoundly troubling, the closer it gets, the more effort we put into denying it.
When it comes to the climate crisis, the personal is political. I am talking about a politics that grows from opposition and critique of our current systems. This is evident in young people organising school strikes and protesters willing to get arrested for their direct action. But we also need to pay more attention to what is lost, to who and what we care for, to other possible ways of being.
Some conservation scientists, at least, see recent cultural change as a hopeful sign of a growing sense of care and responsibility. So stop feeling guilty, it’s not your fault. Be attentive to what’s going on, so that you might notice what you care about and why. What are you capable of, and what might we be capable of together, when we aren’t caught between knowing and not knowing, denial and distress?
New South Wales Labor announces plan for 500,000 households to get rooftop solar
Labor announces plan for 500,000 households to get rooftop solar, https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/labor-announces-plan-for-500-000-households-to-get-rooftop-solar-20190209-p50wrl.html, By Laura Chung,February 9, 2019 NSW Labor has announced it will support a program to help 500,000 households to install rooftop solar, reducing electricity bills in the next 10 years.
Under Labor’s Solar Homes policy, owner-occupied households in NSW with a combined income of $180,000 or less would be eligible for a rebate, to be capped at $2200 per household.
Shadow Minister for Energy and Climate Change, Adam Searle, said the policy could add solar to an additional million homes over the next decade, and could save the average household anywhere between $600 and $1000 a year on electricity bills.
“This is a bold program to push NSW to the front of the energy revolution,” he said. “This will significantly cut electricity bills and carbon emissions.”
“We will have much more to say about energy and tackling climate change.”
The program would be phased in during the 2019-2020 financial year. The policy announcement comes ahead of the launch of Labor’s campaign bus, which will travel around the state from Sunday.
The Smart Energy Council said Labor’s policy addressed two of NSW residents’ main concerns: the cost of living and climate change.
It shows “a strong commitment towards climate change” and is a “sign of confidence in renewable energy, a critical part of NSW’s future,” a spokesman said.
The council said it would like to see a stronger commitment from both the NSW Government and the Opposition to supporting families’ purchases of household solar batteries, which would provide people “with a greater sense of control of power and how they use power.”
In a statement, deputy leader of NSW Liberals Dominic Perrottet said Labor “cannot be trusted” to deliver more affordable, reliable and clean energy, “with a history of energy cost blowouts and blunders”.
The NSW Coalition government “is getting on with the job of taking pressure off electricity prices, while maintaining energy security,” Mr Perrottet said.
Contrary to what ANSTO says, nuclear waste returning to Australia IS High Level Waste (HLW)
Gary See Fight To Stop Nuclear Waste Dump In Flinders Ranges SA https://www.facebook.com/groups/344452605899556/,
Scotland’s Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) clearly state that it considers radioactive waste generated at Sellafield in England, and heading to Australia, to be vitrified High Level waste, despite what ANSTO call it. https://www.gov.scot/…/0038…/00389151-pdf/govscot%3Adocument
Steve Dale To think politicians and the nuclear people here got together to deliberately deceive the Australian public – to call what other countries calls “High Level Waste” something else. It’s the same toxic, corrupt thinking that brought us Maralinga. At left is a picture of High Level Waste from a UK document – looks (and is) the same as the stuff they have at Lucas Heights (same link)
from here:
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/…/radwaste.pdf
Climate change already having drastic effects on Torres Strait islands
Climate change eats away at Torres Strait islands, prompting calls for long-term solutions, ABC Far North
A flood prevention method that withstood wild weather this week may be rolled out to other vulnerable Torres Strait communities, including Yam Island where families were left homeless after king tides last year.
Torres Strait Island Regional Council deputy mayor Getano Lui said geotextile sandbags were used for the first time in the Torres Strait this week when abnormally high tides impacted Poruma Island, a cultural hub home to just 200 people.
“It’s getting worse every year,” he said.”Climate change is really having a detrimental effect on all the communities.
“When I was growing up the elders could predict the weather but right now it’s unpredictable.
“The worst is yet to come this year, the king tides are predicted [on February 19] and anything could happen, we could end up with the same catastrophe as Yam Island last year.”
Connection to land, culture under threat
Research from the Torres Strait Regional Authority shows sea levels are rising by 6mm each year — double the global average.
“If this trend continues, relocation is an option many of those on the Torres Strait’s 200 islands and coral cays may be faced with,” Mr Lui said.
“What is instilled in us and our ancestors is if the Torres Strait sinks, we’ll sink with it.
“We would be very reluctant to be relocated.
“Most of us would refuse to leave.”
Torres Shire Council mayor Vonda Malone said the region’s two councils would now look at installing the sandbags on other vulnerable islands such as Yam Island, Masig Island and Boigu.
“The weather over the last two weeks has been unpredictable; it has been full on,” she said…..
Sinking cemeteries a concern for State MP
….https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-09/call-for-increased-flood-protection-in-torres-strait/10794696
Bob Brown to lead anti coal mine convoy from Hobart to Queensland’s Galilee Basin, and Canberra
Dr Bob Brown leads anti coal mine convoy, Examiner, Sue Bailey 7 Feb 19,
About 100 Tasmanians have so far signed up to join an anti-Adani coal mine road convoy which organisers say will be bigger than the protest to stop the damming of the Franklin River.
Environmentalist and former Australian Greens leader Bob Brown says if the Adani coal mine goes ahead a peaceful protest convoy will leave Hobart on April 17 bound for Queensland’s Galilee Basin and then back to Canberra ahead of the federal election.
“Now that’s an economic, employment and environmental win for Tasmania and Australia.
Dr Brown said thousands of people joined the Franklin blockade and hundreds were arrested and he expected many Australians would join the convoy which would travel through Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
He said the Federal and Queensland governments should not tick off the mine and Labor would be foolish to support it.
“Bloomberg says this is the most contentious coal mine on earth,” Dr Brown said.
“Climate change is the big vote changer.
“Adani is a litmus test for common sense in this age of global heating.”
Dr Brown said 1100 people,including 100 Tasmanians, had already expressed interest in joining the convoy which will be led by electric cars and other vehicles…….. https://www.examiner.com.au/story/5892738/dr-bob-brown-leads-anti-coal-mine-convoy/?cs=95
Anti Adani protesters rally outside the Sydney Mining Club
Anti-Adani protesters outside CEO speech, SBS , 8 Feb 19,
A group of protesters have rallied outside the Sydney Mining Club, where Adani Australia’s CEO was speaking about the company’s Carmichael coal mine. More than 100 people have rallied against Adani’s controversial Carmichael coal mine as the company’s Australian boss spruiked the project to industry figures.
The protesters carried placards and chanted loudly outside the Sydney Mining Club on Thursday as chief executive Lucas Dow delivered his lunchtime speech.
“We’re not going to stop until they listen,” one speaker told the crowd……..
The Queensland government in January appointed an environmental group to review the mine’s management plan, including plans to conserve 33,000 hectares of pastoral land bought near the 1300-hectare site to offset habitat loss for black-throated finch.
The LNP believes the move has put the project at risk. https://www.sbs.com.au/news/anti-adani-protesters-outside-ceo-speech
This New South Wales court ruling will shake the coal industry to its core
Paparc People Against Political and Religious Corruption, 8 Feb 19,
In an Australian first, and a decision that will no doubt set a precedent in this country, and shake the coal industry to its core, a proposed coal mine in Gloucester has been denied and rejected by the Chief Justice of the Land and Environment Court.
“Wrong place because an open-cut coal mine in this scenic and cultural landscape, proximate to many people’s homes and farms, will cause significant planning, amenity, visual and social impacts.
“Wrong time because the [greenhouse gas] emissions of the coal mine and its coal product will increase global total concentrations of [greenhouse gases] at a time when what is now urgently needed, in order to meet generally agreed climate targets, is a rapid and deep decrease in emissions.”
‘Dire consequences’: NSW court quashes plans for new coal mine
http://www.abc.net.au/…/rocky-hill-mine-plans-qaus…/10792902
There is still no deal on royalties for Adani coal mine with Queensland government
Adani yet to sign royalties deal with Queensland government, Fin Rev, By Mark Ludlow, Feb 7, 2019
Indian energy giant Adani has yet to sign a royalties agreement with the Queensland government for its controversial $2 billion Carmichael mine.
In a further setback for the mine and rail project – which has become a lightning rod for environmental activists across the country – it can be revealed that while there was an in-principle agreement about a royalty framework for the project, it has yet to be finalised between the company and the Palaszczuk Labor government….. (subscribers only) https://www.afr.com/news/politics/adani-yet-to-sign-royalties-deal-with-queensland-government-20190207-h1ayhi
Adani doesn’t want a “Mega-Mine” any more
Adani chief rues original plans for ‘mega-mine’ Brisbane Times, By Nick Bonyhady, February 7, 2019 The chief executive of major coal miner Adani says he rues the way the company’s controversial Carmichael coal mine was originally announced as a 60 million tonne mega-mine in 2010 before being scaled down to a 10 million tonne project last year……..
A CFMEU spokeswoman said their official had spoke about central Queensland and that the quote was not a reference to Adani specifically, but that the union supported resource jobs in the state. The Labor Party was contacted for comment.
Mr Dow named the Queensland seats of Flynn, Capricornia, Dawson and Herbert as federal electorates where the mine’s fate would be particularly influential in the election. But Mr Dow also lauded the Coalition for its support of the project, which he said was very nearly underway after being delayed for eight years.
A Queensland government investigation into whether the company breached bore water extraction requirements is ongoing, as is a Federal Court challenge to the validity of a meeting at which indigenous owners approved the company’s indigenous land use agreement.
Adani had sought hundreds of millions of dollars in government loans for the project but its applications were rejected after political pressure from environmental groups……. https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/companies/adani-chief-rues-original-plans-for-mega-mine-20190207-p50wbh.html
1 This month
4 November – Will AUKUS keep us safe – at what cost?
the Commissioners of the AUKUS Public Inquiry present their findings at the National Press Club of Australia in Canberra. iview.abc.net.au/show/national-press-club-address
Submissions to the federal government’s new draft framework close on the 13th November 2026.
Australians deserve the truth
about
AUKUS – https://aukuspublicinquiry.com/
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
