Heavy equipment strikes coal as it’s poured onto a stack close to Muswellbrook within the Hunter Valley, Australia, Nov. 2, 2021. The Australian authorities, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2023, has for the primary time rejected a coal mining software based mostly on environmental regulation.(AP Photograph/Mark Baker)
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia has for the primary time rejected a coal mining software based mostly on environmental regulation.
The federal government is below strain to curb local weather change by blocking all new coal and gasoline extraction initiatives. Australia is among the world’s largest exporters of each fossil fuels, that are main sources of the nation’s wealth. However Atmosphere Minister Tanya Plibersek mentioned Thursday she would determine particular person initiatives on their deserves.
“I’ll make every determination that comes earlier than me on a case-by-case foundation based on the regulation and based on the science that’s obtainable,” Plibersek instructed Parliament.
On Wednesday, she introduced her determination to forestall the Central Queensland Coal Mission from being excavated northwest of the Queensland state city of Rockhampton and fewer than 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the Nice Barrier Reef off the northeast Australian coast.
The mission would have had unacceptable impacts on contemporary water within the space and probably on fragile seagrass meadows that feed dugongs and supply fish breeding grounds, she mentioned.
The open-pit mine has an estimated excavation capability of 10 million metric tons (11 million U.S. tons) of coal yearly for 25 years.
Plibersek mentioned the chance of “air pollution and irreversible harm to the reef may be very actual.”
“The Nice Barrier Reef is liable for about 6 billion Australian {dollars}’ ($4.2 billion) price of financial exercise yearly, about 64,000 jobs,” Plibersek mentioned. “Given the science earlier than me, it grew to become obvious that the dangers have been just too nice.”
The mine was proposed by mining magnate Clive Palmer, who based and funds the minor conservative United Australia Celebration.
Central Queensland Coal, a subsidiary of Palmer’s Mineralogy, didn’t instantly reply Thursday to a request for remark.
A United Nations-backed mission beneficial in November that the Nice Barrier Reef be added to the record of endangered World Heritage websites, warning that with out “bold, fast and sustained” local weather motion, the world’s largest coral reef was in peril.
Whereas warming oceans was the best risk to the community of greater than 2,500 reefs protecting 348,000 sq. kilometers (134,000 sq. miles), water high quality and runoff from the Queensland coast have been additionally dangers.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s center-left Labor Celebration authorities has elevated Australia’s ambition for lowering the nation’s greenhouse gasoline emissions because it was elected final yr.
The Parliament enshrined in regulation Labor’s election pledge to cut back Australia’s greenhouse gasoline emissions by 43% under 2005 ranges by 2030. The earlier conservative authorities had a extra modest goal to cut back emissions by between 26% and 28% by the top of the last decade.
Labor has relied on the minor Greens social gathering’s 12 senators to get laws by way of the higher chamber.
The Greens, who misplaced a senator this week when Sen. Lidia Thorpe grew to become an unbiased, need Australia to slash emissions by 75% by 2030 and are pressuring the federal government to ban any additional coal and gasoline initiatives.
The federal government faces one other contentious vitality business determination when it considers extending an offshore gasoline exploration license off Sydney’s northern seashores.
In late 2021, the earlier conservative authorities rejected a two-year extension of the PEP-11 drilling license within the face of fierce group opposition solely months earlier than an election. The mission proponent Asset Vitality took the federal government to courtroom. However that courtroom motion has ended final week with Albanese’s authorities agreeing to reassess the earlier authorities’s determination.
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