More than 1,000 hectares of koala habitat – as well as 70 hectares of greater glider habitat – would be cleared to dig coal under a new mine being proposed in central Queensland.
Despite both marsupials being recently listed as endangered due to habitat loss, the proposed mine, which is currently under consideration by the state government, does not require an environmental impact statement (EIS).
Vitrinite’s proposed Vulcan South project is the latest in what environmental campaigners describe as a “disturbing trend” of coalmines being proposed that fall fractionally below the thresholds that trigger the EIS process.
At Vulcan South, Vitrinite proposes to produce 1.95m tonnes of coal every year, below the 2m tonne threshold that would require the company to prepare an EIS.
Vitrinite already has approval for an adjacent mine, Vulcan, that will also produce 1.95m tonnes a year. That mine is clearing more than 200ha of koala habitat and was approved by former Coalition federal government in March.
The company said it would “conservatively offset the affected habitat” from the Vulcan South site in a “managed offset area specifically focused on koala habitat conservation”, and that the project would have limited long-term impacts on koala populations
Prof David Lindenmayer, an Australian National University ecologist, said allowing the habitat of endangered species to be destroyed “made a mockery” of environmental protections.
“What’s the point of uplisting a species to endangered if you’re then going to just allow more and more habitat for that species to be cleared?” he said.
Lindenmayer said a piecemeal approach to environmental approval, in which projects were assessed in isolation, amounted to a system that threatened to make Australia the “extinction capital of the planet”.
“We need to consider cumulative impacts,” he said. “It’s like the difference between losing a leg and losing two legs.”
The latest state of the environment report, released on Tuesday, found Australia has lost more mammal species than any other continent, and has one of the highest rates of species decline in the developed world. Habitat destruction and clearing were named as major causes of extinction, along with introduced species.
Vitrinite said ecological assessments it submitted to the Queensland Department of Environment to support the Vulcan South application last month were “prepared to an EIS technical standard”.
Those documents showed the company would clear 1,023.6ha of koala habitat.
“Koalas exist sparsely in the Bowen Basin and as such, the proposed project activities are expected to effect a small number of individuals,” a spokesperson for the company said. “The adjoining koala habitat of the Cherwell-Harrow Range extends for 170,000ha.”
The spokesperson said Vulcan and Vulcan South were “separate, small scale, short term mines” located 10 kilometres apart, and that production rates were “reflective of the mining strategy, equipment used and business model being employed”.
They also said “post-mining rehabilitation targets include the re-establishment of koala habitat” and that koalas had “been known to recolonise rehabilitated land in as little as six years” – though acknowledging it would probably take longer in this case.
The Australian Koala Foundation’s chair, Deborah Tabart, said environmental offsets were ineffective.
“It’s not a valid process,” Tabart said. “It’s like the emperor’s new clothes. How can anything survive if you knock its habitat down?”
Last December the department allowed another proposed mining project, Gemini, to be exempt from providing an EIS. That mine is slated to produce 1.9m tonnes a year.
Mackay Conservation Group’s Jonathon Dykyj wrote to Queensland’s environment minister, Meaghan Scanlon, last Thursday asking that Vitrinite be compelled to submit an EIS for Vulcan South.
The letter also called for the 2m-tonne threshold to be scrapped, given multiple projects are being proposed just short of that amount.
“That to me is a disturbing trend,” Dykyj said. “That mechanism should just be taken off the table.”
Questions to Scanlon’s office were directed to the department, which said that “a robust assessment” would still be undertaken at Vulcan South and “regardless of whether an EIS is required, the same environmental standards will apply”.
“This includes an opportunity for members of the public to make public submissions about the proposal,” the department’s spokesperson said.
Should that process approve Vulcan South, it would probably head to the office of the new federal environment minister, Tanya Plibersek.
“I will be carefully considering the impacts for any project that is referred to me,” the minister said.
