A cattle station owner trying to stop a gas company from fracking on his property has taken his fight to the Supreme Court.
Gas company Sweetpea Petroleum began preparatory works for fracking at Tanumbirini Station in the gas-rich Beetaloo Basin last month.
Stretching across an area more than twice the size of Tasmania, the basin - 400 kilometres south of Darwin - contains enough shale gas to power Australia for an estimated 200 years.
A two-day hearing began in Darwin on Monday morning, with lawyers appealing a decision which allowed fracking exploration to go ahead.
The decision was made by the NT Civil and Administrative Tribunal in May, which granted Sweetpea an access agreement to begin exploration work on the cattle station, owned by Rallen Australia.
It allowed Sweetpea to cut a fence at Tanumbirini Station and move machinery onto two paddocks at the property, despite the opposition of the cattle station owners.
Rallen Australia will receive a minimum of $15,000 compensation per gas well drilled on the property as a part of the agreement.
Tanumbirini station owner and Rallen Australia Director Pierre Langenhoven said Sweetpea had shown "flagrant disrespect" undertaking exploration work in the face of his company's opposition.
"Its operations are already causing havoc," Mr Langenhoven said.
"They have cut our fences, bulldozed access routes and flaunted their own plans for protecting our stock and managing weeds."
The chief executive of Sweetpea's parent company, Tamboran Resources, said the company was working within the approved terms of the access agreement and had worked closely with all stakeholders.
"Pastoral lease and exploration lease holders are granted overlapping tenures by the Northern Territory," Joel Riddle said.
"These lease holders have come to agreements across the Northern Territory and Australia successfully over many decades to manage their dual rights over public land and will continue to do so to the mutual benefit of industry, traditional owners and the environment."
First legal test of new laws
Lawyers for the cattle station owner said the case would be a test of new land access laws, passed in 2020, to try to balance the interests of the pastoral and gas industries.
The laws gave the tribunal power to impose access arrangements if negotiating parties could not reach an agreement.
"We have some serious concerns about the adequacy of the agreement and so the appeal to this court is testing the new process," lawyer Kathy Merrick said.
The lawyers are arguing the access agreement imposes lesser standards on Sweetpea than the standard minimum protections required under Northern Territory law, and fails to balance the interests of the cattle station and gas company.
"The petroleum industries argue that they have entitlements, but their entitlements are to minerals under the earth and my client's entitlements are to operate a business without interruption on the surface," Ms Merrick said.
"To have an explorer argue that cutting the surface of the land up to get access to the assets below doesn't result in the interference is something that we struggle with."
Tamboran Resources' chief executive Joel Riddle said there was a need to balance the rights of competing interests.
Concern over long-term future of cattle station
Mr Langenhoven said he was concerned about the long-term viability of the cattle station if the access agreement was upheld.
"I don't have an issue with them sharing the land, but I've got an issue with them dictating how we can use the land," he said.
"It's different if they come and consult us and actually understand our business, understand what it takes to run a cattle business, and sit down and make plans how we can do it together.
"But to date, it's their way or no way.
