THE discovery of the Great Artesian Basin in 1848, paved the way for the opening up of the outback and the development of the nation’s sheep and cattle industries. Vast tracts of arid land in Queensland, and parts of northern NSW and South Australia, finally had access to a reliable water supply. That groundwater remains […]
A wonderful and informative program from Alan Jones about the “agricultural vandalism” that politicians are engaging in – and the price they will pay at the next election. He said that the governments’ “endless pursuit of mining money” must end – they must realise that we can’t eat coal!!
Farmers will become more violent, depressed and even suicide as they face the biggest threat ever to their mental health unless there’s a change to current mining policies.
AUSTRALIA’S coal seam gas industry could extract an average of 300 gigalitres from groundwater systems every year for the next 25 years, experts predict.
That amount of water would be more than half as much as is presently extracted from the Great Artesian Basin each year.
The “conservative” projection is contained in a submission from the National Water Commission that was among hundreds put to a NSW parliamentary inquiry into coal seam gas.
SEAM stimulation sounds like something from a pornographic film. But it’s the new term for ‘fracking’ being used by the coal seam gas industry.
Under the present process, when exploration licences are granted, there is no requirement for specific environmental issues to be addressed in detail, with no public exhibition or consultation requirements, he said. ”Title renewals are equally problematic, with no clear, objective tests which the minister must apply and no public consultation requirements. There should be a rigorous process introduced to apply before titles are granted with full public transparency.”
An estimated 5.5 million hectares of petroleum exploration titles have expired with no information available on the status of these licences or how they are assessed for renewal.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/oil-gas-licences-ignite-demands-for-overhaul-20110918-1kg5i.html#ixzz1YuzycQlr
“Assessment of impacts of the proposed coal seam gas operations on surface and groundwater systems in the Murray-Darling Basin.”
Read some of these many official documents, on “Contaminants in Natural Gas Wastewater” and “E.P.A. Scientist Discusses Radioactivity in Waste” etc. There are links to many dozens of documents at this site.
Alan Jones speaks to Dr Reg Pascoe, Heather Brown, Nicki Laws and Rob McCreath about mining and the desecration of farm land.
BHP’s $45b giant: the bigger, deeper Olympic Dam