SINGAPORE HAZE - Environmental Offsets - Appendices 2 & 3

APPENDIX 2

National Parks Association of Queensland Inc.

Submission on Waratah Coal Galilee Coal Project

Environmental Impact Statement

19th November 2011

The National Parks Association of Queensland (NPAQ) is an environmental nongovernment organisation established in 1930 to promote the preservation, expansion and wise management of National Parks and protected areas in Queensland. Many of the major National Parks in Queensland were declared following field-based surveys, biodiversity assessments and representation by NPAQ to the State government.

NPAQ advocates for strategic additions to the protected area estate, especially the acquisition of those areas that will enable Australian vegetation communities, plants and animals to adapt to the impact of climate change. In addition, NPAQ members make significant contributions to protected area management, through projects such as Friends of Park, and continue to provide input into the WildNet database, which underpins management decisions made about species conservation.

NPAQ has a strong interest in Nature Refuges as a valuable conservation tool to promote biodiversity protection in Queensland. NPAQ also supports the Government's Q2 protected area targets which, if achieved, will see the Nature Refuge estate grow to seven million hectares by 20201.

NPAQ’s comments on Waratah Coal's Chine First Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) focus on the impact this proposed mine would have on Bimblebox Nature Refuge (BNR). Consistent with this stance, NPAQ believes that this incredibly biodiverse property - providing 8,000 hectares of intact remnant bushland in a region dominated by land cleared for grazing - should be protected forever.

NPAQ's submission highlights four major areas around which the Association strongly objects to the current mining proposal:

1. Direct impact of mining on Bimblebox Nature Refuge

2. Loss of significant conservation and refuge values of the Nature Refuge

3. The inadequacy of proposed offsets

4. Dangerous precedent for the destruction of protected areas

1 At the time of writing, 398 Nature Refuges covering 2.8 million hectares can be found in Queensland.

1. Direct impact of mining on Bimblebox Nature Refuge

The comprehensive and direct impact of mining on Bimblebox is undeniable. The EIS states that although the above ground works are expected to clear slightly greater than 50% of the reserve, this may lead to public and environmental perception that there is a substantial visual impact even though the site is only partially affected (Vol 2, Ch 5, pg 163). The following list of potential impacts (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 187) to Bimblebox created by the proposed clearing illustrate that these perceptions are well founded, especially given that sub-surface mining and associated infrastructure activity will essentially destroy the ecology of the remaining half of Bimblebox:

>Direct reduction in remnant vegetation due to clearing;

>Increased edge effects within Bimblebox Nature Refuge, including the potential to increase the abundance of buffel grass and other weeds;

>Potential for increased fire intensity associated with likely buffel grass infestations;

>Potential changes to vegetation above underground mining areas;

>Potential for dust to reduce the health of retained vegetation in the vicinity of the clearance footprint

>Potential for temporary facilities, materials and equipment to damage areas outside the construction footprint;

>Potential to alter the hydrological characteristics for areas above the underground mining area and areas adjoining downstream of the mine;

>Potential for accidental and inappropriate release of pollutants.

NPAQ believes that these potential impacts will be fully realised if the China First project proceeds, relegating Bimblebox to a highly altered and fragmented relict of its former conservation value. Mining will irrevocably change the nature of this Nature Refuge, creating a dangerous and unacceptable precedent for the clearing of similar properties.

The destruction of Bimblebox will also affect landholder commitment to conservation in Central Queensland. Equally important to the demonstrably conservation value of these Refuges is the ongoing commitment by the Bimblebox landowners and others to manage their land sustainably by giving priority to biodiversity. On BNR, this is manifest in their strategic use of grazing to protect flora and fauna, their hosting of research projects designed to improve land management in the Desert Uplands, and their approach to managing fire and eradicating invasive species. These efforts are not mentioned or captured anywhere within the EIS. Mining Bimblebox sends a clear message to other conservation minded graziers that their efforts are not valued or held in high regard. [Note that 40 Agforce members have Nature Refuges on their properties, covering over one million hectares in Queensland.]

2. Loss of significant conservation and refuge values of Bimblebox Nature Refuge

The Bimblebox property was bought specifically with the aim of protecting the land from clearing. It is managed for its rich biodiversity values and as a working example of integrated production and conservation. The Federal National Reserve System program contributed almost $300,000 for its purchase, and it is covered by a perpetual conservation agreement with the State Government. In summary, significant features of the Bimblebox Nature Refuge include:

>Essential habitat for the endangered Black-throated Finch (BTF);

>Habitat for the vulnerable Squatter Pigeon;

>Relative abundance of the near threatened Black-chinned Honeyeater;

>Relative abundance of the near threatened Large Podded Tick-trefoil

>15 EPBC-listed marine or migratory bird species

>One migratory butterfly species, and 14 bird, mammal and reptile species of conservation significance for the Desert Uplands, including koalas

>Current bird species count of 143 species

>Crucial habitat in a landscape otherwise dominated by cleared grazing land.

NPAQ notes that Birds Australia has verified the sighting of endangered Blackthroated Finches by one of its members on BNR in May 2011. This important discovery confirms the need for systematic and regular surveys of this species on the Refuge to ascertain full population numbers and areas of critical habitat.

In addition, the Desert Uplands IBRA Report for bird biodiversity states that: Although the avifauna of Desert Uplands is typical of tropical woodlands across northern Australia, it appears to contain the last substantial population of the southern sub-species of the black-throated finch, a taxon that has disappeared from most of its range in southern Queensland and northern New South Wales since the last (Birds Australia) Atlas survey period. There are a few introduced species in the bioregion, but there have been significant declines in the reporting rate of many woodland taxa and ground-feeding insectivores. This may be related to the extensive land clearance that has occurred in recent decades.

The Desert Uplands Report goes on to suggest that an important action is to: Secure a functional landscape against clearance and overgrazing, including adequate representative areas of each community.

As noted above, other significant bird species that have been sighted include the vulnerable Squatter Pigeon and the Black-chinned Honeyeater (listed as near threatened).

NPAQ is also concerned about the loss of several vegetation communities on Bimblebox, particularly:

RE 10.3.4 (least concern/of concern) Low open-woodland to woodland of Acacia cambagei with very open tussock grassland, which is recorded as providing habitat for the endangered species Nesaea robertsii. While this species is not mentioned within the EIS and not recorded during associated field surveys, this does not rule out the possibility that populations of this species are yet to be found on BNR.

RE 10.3.12 (least concern/no concern) Fringing and frontage Corymbia plena and C. dallachiana open woodland, usually with Aristida spp. dominant in the ground layer. The REDD database notes that this ecosystem has important values for stabilising stream banks and top soils, providing corridors for wildlife, and for trapping soil and maintaining water quality.

RE 10.3.27 (least concern/of concern)

Open-woodland to woodland of Eucalyptus populnea occasionally with understorey of Archidendropsis basaltica. The only protected areas that provide formal protection for this regional ecosystem is Cudmore National Park and Cudmore Resources Reserve.

Bimblebox is truly a nature refuge, actively preventing the elevation of a range of species and vegetation communities into threatened or endangered categories. Given the number and extent of major coal projects proposed for the vicinity, it is likely that Bimblebox will become an even more important refuge habitat in the future. The prospect of large neighbouring coal mines, particularly the Hancock Alpha coal project, makes retention and protection of the Bimblebox Nature Refuge even more essential.

3. Inadequacy of Proposed Offsets

Under the Queensland Department of Environment and Resource Management Biodiversity Offsets policy, mining companies must meet at least one of three offset options when clearing vegetation of significant environmental values for mining. NPAQ understands that options two and three are not available if an endangered species is present in the mining site. As stated earlier, there is direct evidence that the endangered black-throated finch nests within Bimblebox Nature Refuge. It may also nest in suitable areas within its range along the coal rail corridors proposed by Palmer/Hancock from the Galilee Basin to the port of Abbot Point north of Bowen. To date, ecological surveys have not extensively covered these 495km routes. Offsets option one is only possible where an ecologically equivalent area is available in the bioregion to offset the loss. There is no other area within the bioregion, of comparable size or larger, that contains the same mix of ecosystems and has an understorey that is in equivalent condition to Bimblebox Nature Refuge. Indeed, the commonwealth Nature Refuge Agreement with the Bimblebox Nature refuge owners states that sites within the property contain the greatest understorey floristic biodiversity for these vegetation types within the region.

Furthermore, Waratah Coal has not demonstrated in the EIS that appropriate offset areas exist in the vicinity of Bimblebox Nature Refuge. Appendix 27 describes a desktop study undertaken to locate areas of remnant vegetation of the dominant [Regional Ecosystems] found within the [Bimblebox Nature Refuge] (Appendix 27,

p.31). NPAQ believes that the biodiversity values of an offset should be fully demonstrated, ground-truthed and documented within the EIS before they can be used to offset biodiversity losses.

 

NPAQ is extremely concerned that offsets themselves are not permanently protected from clearing for other mining at a later date. This is a significant problem in mining basins such as the Bowen, Galilee and Surat Basins, which are almost completely covered with coal and petroleum (coal seam and shale gas) mining permits. One offset is offset by another and the process potentially continues across the Brigalow, Desert Uplands, Einsleigh Uplands and Mitchell Grass Downs Bioregions until potentially little remains but fragmented habitat, regrowth and revegetation areas, with a subsequent severe decline in biodiversity.

Offsetting remains a controversial and uncertain option for protected areas. As stated in the Waratah Coal EIS, no specific offset policy is currently in place for protected areas (Appendix 27, p.15). This reflects the fact that both the State and Federal governments are yet to determine how the destruction of protected areas could be appropriately compensated for, if at all. Since there has been no adequate or conclusive public discussion of this matter, NPAQ believes that it would be highly inappropriate to proceed with any action that may cause significant negative impact on a protected area such as a Nature Refuge.

In summary, offsetting Bimblebox will result in a net loss of biodiversity for the region and state. Indeed, it is questionable whether this Nature Refuge can actually have its biodiversity loss offset according to the Queensland Biodiversity Offsets Policy. Offsetting would be an entirely inadequate approach to compensation for the loss of Bimblebox Nature Refuge. There should be no mining on Bimblebox Nature Refuge, and future legislative change should be made to ensure that Nature Refuges with significant environmental values can be sterilised from mining in the same way that National Parks are.

4. An Unacceptable Precedent

Bimblebox Nature Refuge occupies Glenn Innes station just north of the Central Queensland township of Alpha. Ninety-five per cent has never been cleared of its original ecosystems and provides excellent habitat for many of the species in the Desert Uplands, an area now covered by coal mining and coal seam gas exploration permits. Only 3.1% of this bioregion is recorded as protected in the National Reserve System, far less that the internationally recommended 17%. The Commonwealth rated the property as IUCN Category IV, further evidence that Bimblebox should never be mined, or be subject to any actions that will adversely affect its environmental values. If Bimblebox is mined, it sets an unacceptable precedent for mining other Nature

Refuges, areas that the Queensland government promised would be protected for perpetuity. Nature Refuge declarations are not made lightly, only cover lands with significant conservation values, and provide an incredibly valuable public good for the benefit of future generations.

It is simply inexcusable that any Nature Refuge should ever be mined. When the Queensland government signed the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, they agreed to report on lands set aside for biodiversity protection under the National Reserve System. Nature Refuges are a part of this system. If the China First mine is allowed to proceed, it will be the first time that a Queensland property covered by a Nature Refuge Agreement was destroyed for mineral extraction. This sets an unacceptable precedent for the Queensland protected area estate and directly undermines the State Government's Q2 protected area target of achieving 20 million hectares of protected land by 2020, of which seven million hectares will be delivered by Nature Refuges. Approval for the mine’s development also contravenes the State Government's perpetual Nature Refuge conservation agreement, and National and International IUCN protected area standards.

There should be no mining on Bimblebox Nature Refuge, and future legislative change should be made to ensure that Nature Refuges with significant environmental values are sterilised from mining, and given the same level of protection as a National Park.

Paul Donatiu  Executive Coordinator  National Parks Association of Queensland

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Appendix 3

Background Briefing  “The trouble with offsets” broadcast on Broadcast:16 March 2014

Image: In January 2014 over 100 people shut down construction at the Maules Creek mine. The protesters used tripod structures to block entry to the mine. (Flickr/Leard State Forest Alliance)

Environmental offsets are supposed to compensate for ecosystems and biodiversity that are bulldozed to make way for development. But there’s mounting evidence the policy is being subverted, as governments approve controversial offsets across Australia. Di Martin investigates.

A Senate inquiry has just been launched into claims a key environmental policy, offsetting, is falling over. Under offsetting, developers have to compensate for what they're bulldozing. They need to protect other properties that contain the same sort of vegetation and habitat as what's being cleared. “To me it is akin to some guy going into that art gallery and pointing at the Mona Lisa on the wall and 'saying sorry mate we need that bit ... so the Mona Lisa has to go. But we will paint you another one”. Professor Richard Hobbs, ecologist

The promise of offsetting is that development can happen and biodiversity will be no worse off. However offsets have always been controversial and an increasing number of scientists, ecologists and conservationists say there are many loopholes and the policy is being manipulated by governments who won't say no to developers.  Federal Greens Senator Larissa Waters pushed for the Senate inquiry, listing five developments for investigation.

They include the Abbot Point Coal Terminal and Waratah Coal's Galilee Coal Project in Queensland, the Jandakot Airport in Perth, and the Maules Creek coal mine in northern NSW.

Clearing has already begun on the Maules Creek mine site, destroying critically endangered white box gum grassy woodland which is down to 0.1 per cent of its original range.

The mining company, Whitehaven Coal, says it's protecting large areas of critically endangered box gum woodland on its offset properties. But local ecologist Phil Spark says Whitehaven's claims are wrong. He took Background Briefing to the two largest offset properties in an area marked as white box grassy woodland.

'We are looking around us and we see the dominance of stringy bark, probably 80 per cent stringybark. And it's not white box at all,' Mr Spark said.

There are now four local ecologists who've looked at Whitehaven Coal's offsets and found serious problems.

Dr John Hunter is a botanist who specialises in critically endangered communities and has helped develop offset plans for other mines. He has prepared a preliminary report on 1600 hectares of Whitehaven's offsets, and says that 95 per cent of their mapping is wrong.

'I think there's at maximum, five per cent of what they are saying is box gum woodland there,' he said. 'All of the dominance that we found there, are actually trees that they haven't listed as occurring.' Instead, the dominant trees that Hunter found were stringybark, New England blackbutt, orange gum and Bendemeer white gum, which weren't represented in the mapping.

'The maps are patently wrong. They are just completely wrong,' he said.

Another local ecologist, Wendy Hawes, sat on an expert panel that wrote the condition criteria used to identify box gum grassy woodlands. She has looked at four areas mapped as box gum grassy woodland, and found hardly any at all. “It is not the community they claim it is,” she said. 'There are within their offset areas ... small patches that could potentially meet the [criteria], but they are very small areas, so they are a couple of hectares. Nothing like the hectarage they are claiming. So the majority of the stuff that they are protecting is stringy bark communities. Not white box,' Hawes said.

Neither the state nor the federal government did on the ground surveys of the offset sites before approving the Maules Creek mine. Whitehaven Coal's CEO Paul Flynn was not available for interview, but the company said in a statement that it is committed to meeting its offset obligations. It also claimed that reports critical of its offsets are incomplete and deliberately distorted, and the company is protecting an area far larger than what is being cleared on the mine site. The dissenting ecologists agree that Whitehaven's offset area is larger, but maintain the vegetation it contains is not the same as what is being bulldozed.

When the Maules Creek mine was approved, Whitehaven Coal was required to complete an independent review of the offset sites. That report has been handed to the Federal government, but has not been released. Environment Minister Greg Hunt declined to be interviewed, but issued a statement saying he's aware of the issue, and his department is now considering the independent review. The department recently told a Senate estimates hearing that it's investigating what it calls a criminal matter regarding the Maules Creek offsets.* It is a crime to be reckless or negligent in providing false or misleading information about offsets. The Environment Department said it could be some months before its investigation is complete. [Meanwhile, the bulldozing has continued unabated …until there is nothing left to protect? Demonstrably illegal!....mb]

The ANU's Phil Gibbons, who helped develop offset policy for the federal and NSW governments, says the theory behind offsetting is very attractive. “A fair-minded person would agree that if a developer destroys some of Australia's natural capital in making a buck, then they should really offset that impact elsewhere,” he said. “But the devil is in the detail.”

Gibbons said he sees an increasing number of examples where governments are cutting corners. Some offsets are not like for like and others are not being properly managed or restored. Some sites have been approved that weren't in danger of being cleared or lost in the future.

“Anything that you do in terms of an offset must be a genuine gain, must be something that would not have happened anyway as under business as usual,” Gibbons said. “I think what people are doing is getting very creative in finding biodiversity gains when really they are things that would have happened anyway.”

With less and less good quality bush to be found, developers are putting up old cattle paddocks and mine sites as offsets, land which they say will be restored to its original state.

However, according to restoration ecologist Professor Richard Hobbs, those sites can take decades to develop, and there's no guarantee they will be the same as what was cleared.

He scoffed at the idea that Australia's biodiversity will be no worse off under offsetting, and called the practice 'a Faustian pact'.

“I'll say it's a furphy. To me it is akin to some guy going into that art gallery and pointing at the Mona Lisa on the wall and saying sorry mate we need that bit ... so the Mona Lisa has to go. But we will paint you another one.”

“We run the risk of trading something irreplaceable for the short term development gains with the mirage of having a good conservation outcome in the future through the activities of the offset.”

Di Martin: We're driving towards the hamlet of Maules Creek. It sits next door to one of Australia's largest open-cut coal mines under construction. Phil Spark heads a local environment group and says the Maules Creek mine is now bulldozing one of the last large remnants of a critically endangered woodland, and it should never have been approved.

Mine owner, Whitehaven Coal, is required to compensate for the loss of this forest. The company has to buy other properties with the same sort of vegetation and habitats to what’s being cleared, and manage those properties as conservation estates. It's a scheme called offsetting.

But Phil Spark takes Background Briefing to the mine's largest offset sites, and says the forest there is nowhere near the same as what's being bulldozed.

Phil Spark: So this area that we've just walked into, mapped as critically endangered ecological community, is not that community at all.

Di Martin: We'll return to Maules Creek later in the program.

Environmental offsets is a relatively new policy that's quickly been adopted by governments across Australia. It promises that development can happen, and biodiversity will be no worse off. But offsets have always been controversial, and recent examples have attracted so much criticism that a Senate Inquiry has been set up to investigate. An increasing number of scientists, ecologists and conservationists say that offset policy is not working, that it's full of loopholes, and is being manipulated by governments who simply won't say no to developers.

A man described as Australia's top restoration ecologist says with less and less good quality bush to be found, developers are putting up degraded land as offsets, land which they say they'll restore to its original state. But Richard Hobbs says that restoration science is new and uncertain, and scoffs at the idea that Australia's biodiversity will be no worse off.

Richard Hobbs: I'll say it's a furphy. To me it's akin to some guy going into the art gallery and pointing at the Mona Lisa on the wall and saying, 'Sorry mate, we need that bit of wall for something else, so the Mona Lisa has to go. But we'll paint you another one.'

Di Martin: To begin today, we need to understand offsets a bit better, from a man who's worked on several offset policies, including for the Commonwealth and New South Wales governments. ANU Professor Phil Gibbons says offsets are all about compensating for the biodiversity we bulldoze in the name of progress.

Phil Gibbons: If you bowl over some bush somewhere, you've got to get an equivalent gain somewhere else. It's that simple.

Di Martin: The theory is that gain can come from restoring old cattle paddocks, or a mine site, or setting aside another bit of good quality bush that would have otherwise perished.

Phil Gibbons: One of the ways that biodiversity offsets work is that people say, well look, if we clear this patch of bush, let's take another patch of bush that might have been lost anyway in the future. It might have been zoned for urban development, it might have weeds coming up to it and impacting on it. Let's protect that area in perpetuity and manage it so it actually improves, and that's where you get the gain.

Di Martin: Phil Gibbons says it's critical that the bit of bush being used as an offset must be the same as what is being bulldozed.

Phil Gibbons: Anything that you lose in terms of biodiversity must be offset by like-for-like, or equivalent biodiversity. So it has got to be the same kind of ecological community, the same habitat. If you have impacted on one particular species, threatened species for instance, then the gain must be for that particular species as well. So it's got to be equivalent or like-for-like. So biodiversity offsets is a mechanism that governments have really embraced in the last decade or so. And Australia is one of the leaders in this area.

Di Martin: Phil Gibbons explains how he's become increasingly outspoken about offsets, as he sees how they're being rolled out across the world.

Phil Gibbons: The theory is fine in terms of biodiversity offsets and you can see why so many governments have embraced it. The problem is in the execution. Biodiversity is incredibly complex. A lot of it…you can't just knock over a patch of bush that is pristine and hope to recreate it elsewhere. They are just too complicated. That's the first problem. The second problem is you've got a tree that's 500 years old, a nice old eucalypt full of hollows that is necessary for a whole host of wildlife. You bowl that over, how do you replace a tree that's 500 years old by planting another tree?

Di Martin: Phil Gibbons says he's seeing various problems emerge; offsets approved that are not like-for-like, offset areas that are not being properly managed or restored, and he's especially worried about offset sites getting approved that weren't in danger of being lost.

Phil Gibbons: You know, you're saying, 'I'm going to protect that area because it would have been lost in the future if I didn't protect it.' How do you prove that it would have been lost in the future? That is a very tricky thing to do. And that's where the offset policy can be gained or manipulated.

Di Martin: Are we being hoodwinked with biodiversity offsets?

Phil Gibbons: In theory biodiversity offsets seem very attractive and I've been involved in the development of several biodiversity offset policies. But the devil is in the detail. And I think the way governments are applying biodiversity offsets in Australia generally are not in the spirit of the policy or the theory. And I just do not think we are getting the improvement in biodiversity conservation that offsets promise.

Di Martin: That's Phil Gibbons from the ANU

Time to return to the Liverpool Plains in northern New South Wales, and we rejoin local ecologist Phil Spark, a fierce critic of offsets for a new open-cut coal mine not far from the hamlet of Maules Creek. The $767 million Maules Creek mine is digging into one of Australia's largest coal deposits. Owners Whitehaven Coal say the royalties and corporate tax alone are worth $6.5 billion in the first two decades of the mine's life. But this coal lies under a critically endangered box gum grassy woodland. Phil Spark says this mine should never have been approved, because the offsets are not equivalent to what's being knocked over, nowhere near like-for-like. Yet the bulldozers are already at work on the Maules Creek mine site.

Di Martin: Phil Spark says the survival of a host of woodland plants and animals depends on large forest remnants, which are much more resilient to impacts like climate change. Leard State Forest contains one of Australia's last large patches of old growth white box grassy woodland.

Phil Spark: We are in an area that's immediately adjoining where they are starting construction for the new Whitehaven mine, an area of white box woodland which is the critically endangered ecological community. It has been reduced down to 0.1% of its original extent.

Di Martin: This white box grassy woodland?

Phil Spark: Yes, it has been over-cleared very much and areas in good condition such as this are very rare.

Di Martin: White box grassy woodland was heavily cleared for farming, its existence a sign of good soil. It's now down to the last of the last. There's virtually none in National Parks, and much of what is left is in fragments, in stock routes and on roadsides, and is being invaded by weeds.

Background Briefing understands staff from the New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage identified Leard State Forest as 'irreplaceable', but were overruled when the state gave the mine its blessing.

Here's Phil Spark:

Phil Spark: Even though this forest was logged for many years, it was only logged in the areas where there is narrow-leaved ironbark and white cypress. So the box woodland areas are actually mature old-growth. So the number of tree hollows is incredibly high, there are over 100 per hectare. Yes, those big mature trees, we're just looking at some there now, there would be five or six hollows in each tree, small ones suitable for bats and reptiles and the large ones suitable for cockatoos and owls and the larger animals.

Di Martin: This forest supports 28 threatened species, especially bats and woodland birds, and is potential habitat for the Swift Parrot and Regent Honeyeater, now believed to be down to the last few hundred individuals. Phil Spark has also found an endangered plant in an area marked up for clearing, a plant missed in Whitehaven Coal's environmental assessment.

Phil Spark: They've marked it all up, it's obviously going to be cleared quite soon, and this little Tylophora linearis, which is a little twiner that twines itself around other shrubs, it hasn't even been considered.

Di Martin: A Whitehaven Coal report says it will conduct pre-clearing surveys and translocate any plants found. Critical in approving the mine are the offsets, properties which Whitehaven has bought and has to manage as conservation estates. There's nearly 10,000 hectares in those offsets, a far greater size than what's being cleared. The properties are supposed protect the same sort of vegetation and habitat that will be lost in Leard State Forest. Like-for-like. But Phil Spark says the size and good condition of white box grassy woodland in Leard makes it near impossible to offset.

Phil Spark: They just think that they can simplistically purchase other properties that will supposedly compensate for this loss, which is not the case, and which is what we are going to actually explain a bit more today.

Di Martin: The Maules Creek mine offsets are in several locations. At the heart of this controversy is the amount of critically endangered box gum grassy woodland on those offset sites. Whitehaven Coal's own offset plan says the vast bulk of this community is on just two properties; Mt Lindesay and Wirradale.

Di Martin: Phil Spark says 'we' because there's now four ecologists who've volunteered their time to review these offset sites and found them seriously lacking. You can see those reports on the Background Briefing website.

Wendy Hawes: That he is correct, that the offsets don't match what is in Leard State Forest.

John Hunter: Yes, well, I reviewed Phil's and Wendy's and did my own, and yes, we are all of the same opinion.

John Hunter: The maps are patently wrong. They are just completely wrong.

Di Martin: Whitehaven Coal's offset plan was developed by environmental consultants, Cumberland Ecology. The plan says there were field studies done to assess these offset areas. Background Briefing contacted Cumberland Ecology for an interview. Its director, Dr David Robertson, said his contract with Whitehaven Coal prevents him from speaking.

Local ecologist Wendy Hawes says those field studies are wrong.

Wendy Hawes: If they have been on site they seriously didn't know what they were looking at.

Di Martin: Background Briefing contacted both the state and federal governments to find out if they did their own field surveys of the offset sites before approving the Maules Creek mine. The federal government admitted it did not. The state government provided no evidence it had surveyed the offset sites either.

So both levels of government approved one of Australia's biggest new open cut coal mines without any independent check of Whitehaven Coal's offset claims. Only when the federal government approved the mine did it order an independent review of the Maules Creek offset areas. But it said Whitehaven could begin clearing Leard State Forest before that review even got underway. The New South Wales Environmental Defenders Office helped challenge the approval in court. Part of the EDO's argument was that the size and condition of white box grassy woodland in Leard State Forest is down to the last of the last, and most probably can't be offset. But the case was lost in December. The Federal Court said it was quite legal to allow mining to begin before the offsets are sorted.

EDO principal solicitor, Sue Higginson:

Sue Higginson: The court could see this is not desirable, words to the effect that this was not desirable from a conservation perspective. But what it did say is that by requiring independent verification, the mine could commence and the clearing could commence. And so therefore you can go ahead, start the project and get rid of part of that critically endangered ecological community, get your house in order with the offsets, if you haven't got your house in order with your offsets, go out and find some more.

Di Martin: Sue Higginson says even if there was no more white box grassy woodland left in Australia, the court would still have found the federal approval was legal. [A no-win situation for Australia’s endangered native species!]

Sue Higginson: So the question before the court was, well, what if there are no more? And the answer to that was ultimately, well, then there is a punishment scheme within the Act to say that you have breached the law. [NO amount of money or prison time for the coal company could ever compensate for hundreds of species going extinct!]

Di Martin: Federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt declined to be interviewed, but provided the following statement: “I am aware that there are concerns around the suitability of the offsets put forward by the proponent and approved by the previous Labor government. An independent review of the proposed offset areas has been submitted, and the Department of the Environment is considering the findings of the review to determine whether the proposed offsets satisfy the requirements of the approval conditions.”

Background Briefing approached Whitehaven Coal's CEO Paul Flynn for an interview, but he was not available. The company did provide a statement. It says it's committed to meeting its offset obligations, and defends David Robertson, the ecologist hired to map the vegetation on those offset sites. Whitehaven also says the reports critical of its offsets are incomplete and deliberately distorted. That statement, and a reply from Dr John Hunter, is on our website.

In the meantime, New England ecologist Phil Spark has lodged a complaint about Cumberland Ecology's David Robertson, who prepared the Maules Creek offset plan. The Ecological Consultant's Association of New South Wales is considering the issue and is due to report this month. Dr Robertson declined to be interviewed, but told Background Briefing that Phil Spark's complaint is politically motivated. David Robertson also says he has more than 20 years’ experience as an ecological consultant, including 13 years working on biodiversity offsets.

However, it's the not the first time Cumberland Ecology's offset work has been criticised in the past few years. The company was the offset consultant for another major coal project near Lithgow, two hours’ drive west of Sydney. Called the Coalpac Consolidation Project, it was a controversial proposal that would have involved strip mining in the Ben Bullen State forest below ancient sandstone pagodas. Local environmental groups said there were serious problems with the offset sites.

It's one of the few major coal projects rejected by both New South Wales Planning Department and the independent reviewer, the Planning Assessment Commission. The Commission said the offset package:

'cannot be considered adequate. The Commission's conclusion on the offset package is that it is designed to exchange a number of fragmented areas that in some instances require extensive rehabilitation … for a single area of high quality habitat … which adjoins like areas of high quality habitat.'

Cumberland Ecology's reply to the Commission's report is posted on our website. Yet even with further changes to the Coalpac proposal, the Department of Planning still didn't approve it.

Only an hour and a half's drive up the road from Lithgow is another coal mine development that's used Cumberland Ecology to prepare its offset plan. That's stage two of the Moolarben Coal Mine, a state preferred project outside the town of Mudgee. Again local environment groups complained about the adequacy of the offsets. The New South Wales Department of Planning has just approved that offset plan, but not without several changes. In its report published late last month, various concerns were raised about the size of the offsets, the quality of the habitat, and whether it was like-for-like. The Planning Department said significant additional areas or four extra properties had to be added to the offset plan before it was accepted. That report is also on our website.

Up on Sydney's north shore is the office of environmental law expert Gerry Bates. He's watched laws and lawmakers fail to protect Australia's biodiversity over many decades.

Gerry Bates: You've got a patch of ecosystem which scientists say is threatened, most people don't understand it, they don't appreciate it, and you are trying to match that against the big dollars involved in a mining project, particularly now the carmakers are leaving Australia, and you've got governments trying to find work and so on. Now, there's a question of values going on here. And biodiversity has always been expendable. That's why it's declining.

Di Martin: Gerry Bates says offsets are becoming a new environmental battleground. He says offset assessments need to be very clear about what's being bulldozed, and what's being put up to compensate for that loss.

Gerry Bates: This is the whole problem with offsets. You have to be very, very rigorous as the decision maker to allow this to happen, and the evidence has to stand up. And of course as we know they are very controversial. A lot of people would start from the point of view that offsetting is not a legitimate tool anyway. But if it's going to be used, it has to be as rigorously and scientifically evaluated as possible, and that's where a lot of the controversy comes about.

Di Martin: Gerry Bates says a key problem is there's no standard accreditation for ecologists.

Gerry Bates: The problem is any Tom, Dick or Harry can stick a plate up at their door and say, hey, I'm an ecological consultant. You know, environmental assessments have been going on since the 1970s, and there are still no formal standards of accreditation for the people who claim to be able to do them. That again is absolutely why the decision-maker has to give the most rigorous analysis to the information provided by the proponent of a development.

Di Martin: The Sydney Morning Herald highlighted this dilemma with an example near Lithgow, an extension of the Invincible mine. The environmental impact statement was written by a mine surveyor, not an ecologist. And that mine surveyor was a part owner of the mine.

The New South Wales Planning Department was quoted as saying there was no issue because:

'the relationship between a mine and the author of an environmental impact statement is irrelevant, because all the supporting material is rigorously checked.'

Even if there's no problem with the way offsets are assessed, there's increasing nervousness about how secure they are. Offsets are supposed to become conservation estates, protected in perpetuity. But that hasn't happened in a high profile New South Wales coal mining operation outside the little town of Bulga, in the Hunter Valley.

Background Briefing's Jess Hill reported on it last year.

Jess Hill: The first coal was dug out of Mount Thorley Warkworth more than 30 years ago. For most of that time, the mine and the residents of Bulga have co-existed in relative harmony. In 2003, Rio Tinto applied to expand the mine. The New South Wales government approved it, but with a very important condition: Saddle Ridge, the hill separating the town from the mine, as well as the critically endangered Warkworth Sands Woodland, were never to be mined.

Di Martin: But just seven years later, after a steep rise in coal prices, Rio Tinto decided it wanted to mine the offset it was supposed to be protecting. It applied to the New South Wales government, and the Planning Minister said yes. The Environmental Defenders Office helped the Bulga community take the case to court. Here's Sue Higginson:

Sue Higginson: And the Chief Judge of the New South Wales Land and Environment Court heard the case about allowing mining in an offset area, looked at what that meant in terms of biodiversity impacts, and he found that they would be unacceptable. So he refused permission to the mining company and they couldn't go ahead with the new part of the mine.

Di Martin: Critical in the decision is the scarcity of the Warkworth Sands woodland. Rio Tinto put up another offset, but the judge found it wasn't like-for-like. The New South Wales government and Rio Tinto quickly appealed the judgement. That decision is still pending.

In the meantime, Rio Tinto proposed another smaller mine expansion which also cuts into the original offset area. That expansion has just been approved by the New South Wales government. Environmental law expert Gerry Bates says the Bulga case shows that any piece of land, offset or otherwise, is not protected in perpetuity.

Gerry Bates: It doesn't matter whether you have a National Park or an offset or a conservation covenant or anything, they are all variable. They can always be revisited in the future.

Di Martin: Gerry Bates says the New South Wales government has also moved to prevent another Bulga style court case. The government has changed the rules so the economic benefits of mining is given top priority in planning decisions. And Gerry Bates says no more merit reviews can go to the Land and Environment Court if there's already been a public hearing before the state's independent reviewer.

Gerry Bates: They have gone further because if the minister sends a major mining project to the Planning Assessment Commission for a public hearing, that will knock out all the types of appeal that were going on in the Bulga case. In other words, Bulga wouldn't be able to happen again if the minister sends the development, the proposal to the Planning Assessment Commission for a public hearing.

The New South Wales Greens recently denounced the Planning Assessment Commission as a rubber stamp after finding it agreed with 96% of approvals made by the state's Department of Planning. With less and less good quality bushland left in Australia, finding an equivalent offset will only become more difficult, which is why developers are putting forward offsets that rely on restoring cleared farm paddocks, or rehabilitating mine sites.

Mining companies often claim that when a pit or a well is closed 'the land is returned to its original state'. But a man described as Australia's top restoration ecologist says that's just wrong. This is Richard Hobbs from the University of Western Australia.

Richard Hobbs: And I think the problem up until now has been that people have seen ecological restoration as being a kind of magic bullet that will come in and solve everything, and I think the response to that is, well, no it's not.

[Birdsong]

Di Martin: This is the sound of Carnaby's black cockatoo, a threatened bird at the heart of an offset controversy that's worrying Richard Hobbs. Only a small proportion of the cockatoos left are young enough to breed, and they rely on the banksia woodlands around Perth. Yet Richard Hobbs says two high-value remnants of banksia woodland have been bulldozed recently, one which was listed to be protected.

Richard Hobbs: Recently there have been several pieces of very nice banksia woodland; one in fact was registered on the state's Bush Forever list as being of particular significance, that were cleared for development. One for a hospital, one for development around Jandakot Airport which is the light plane airport in Perth. Both of these have restoration offsets associated with them. And it must be fair to be said that it is very hard to see how the offsets that are being created will replace the woodlands that are lost.

Di Martin: Talk in more detail about these offsets.

Richard Hobbs: Well, the areas were basically old agricultural land or old grazing land, and at the moment they are what could be best described as plantations, and the native species are probably six inches to a foot tall. There are lots of weeds around and it's going to be quite a long time before it turns into anything looking like what was destroyed. So it begs the question of whether the offsets will be successful or not.

Di Martin: And in the meantime, Carnaby's black cockatoo will just have to deal with less habitat. Richard Hobbs says changes need to be made to offset policy. He says areas that are critically endangered should not be considered for development. Nature reserves should not be declared as offsets. And he says offsets should be a last resort, used only after all other options have been ruled out.

Richard Hobbs: When a development is proposed there is supposed to be a cascade of things that are considered. First of all, can you avoid the damage altogether by doing the development somewhere else entirely? Is there an old brown-field site or something like that nearby that would do just as well? Secondly, can you actually reduce the damage that you are going to do on that site? And there is a lot of evidence accumulating from various parts of the world that that initial stages is more or less being bypassed. People are seeing the offset policy as an opportunity to sidestep the whole question of whether the development should go ahead on a particular place or not.

Di Martin: In other words, governments aren’t wanting to say no?

Richard Hobbs: I think that is entirely true, yes.

Di Martin: But most of all, Richard Hobbs says Australia needs to get rid of the convenient fiction that offsetting means that biodiversity doesn't lose out. He refers to offsetting as a Faustian pact.

Richard Hobbs: The story about Faust is basically where this guy makes a deal with the devil where he trades his soul for knowledge and power. But over time that story is taken to start meaning trading something irreplaceable for success or short-term gain. And I think that's at the nub of what could be the problem with offsets is that we run the risk of trading something irreplaceable for the short-term development gains, with the mirage of having a good conservation outcome in the future through the activities of the offset.

Di Martin: Now it's back to Canberra and a last example that particularly aggrieves one of the architects of offsetting in Australia. The ANU's Dr Phil Gibbons has brought Background Briefing to a box gum woodland park on the city's northern edge. It's right next door to another block scheduled to be cleared for a housing development.

Phil Gibbons: And now we are standing in Watson woodlands or Justice Robert Hope Park, which has now been approved as an offset for a development just ten metres away from us, which extends for four hectares.

Di Martin: Right, so that bit is going to be bulldozed over there, and I believe it has about 40 mature box gum trees on it?

Phil Gibbons: That's right. Mature trees there, looking at them they might be up to 200 years old.

Di Martin: As Phil Gibbons surveys these adjoining sites, he says using Justice Robert Hope Park as an offset is simply wrong. He says the Park only exists because of the hard work of local volunteers to restore the box gum woodland over the past 12 years. Dr Gibbons says those conservation gains are not the work of the developer.

Phil Gibbons: Let's remind ourselves about what offsets are about. A fair-minded person would agree that if a developer destroys some of Australia's natural capital in making a buck, then they should really offset that impact elsewhere, use some of their profits to offset that impact on our natural capital elsewhere.

Di Martin: When Background Briefing contacted both the ACT and Commonwealth governments, they both said the volunteers' work has not been taken into consideration in approving this offset. But Dr Phil Gibbons begs to differ. He helped develop the offset calculator used in this decision. He's gone back over the paperwork and crunched the numbers again, and found that the approval does claim conservation gains made by local volunteers.

Phil Gibbons: But if you look at their actual calculations, they have in fact used the community's goodwill since 2002 in calculating those gains. So in other words, every tree you see in this site that has been planted by the community is contributing to the loss of a tree next door. The community is not going to sign up for that if they know that that is what their work is contributing to.

Di Martin: Phil Gibbons then lists off several other reasons where this offset approval has gone awry, including a pivotal assumption that the Park is not properly protected. It's zoned urban open space, so the argument goes that the Park is in grave danger of being turned into a suburb, and the box gum woodland lost, if it wasn't declared an offset.

Phil Gibbons says that argument is rubbish.

Phil Gibbons: The offset calculator assumes that this site here has a 70% chance, if it wasn't set aside as an offset, it was likely to be destroyed anyway for urban development. And that is plainly wrong. I've calculated that the risk that this site would have been destroyed without it being an offset is actually below 1%.

Di Martin: This is a tiny little site here. It is only 16 hectares over there and four hectares over here. Why should we really be bothered?

Richard Hobbs: Di, you have got to remember, this is a critically endangered ecological community, only 5% of the original distribution. When Europeans came to Australia there was 95% more of this stuff, 5% left. I did some research to show that half of this ecological community is now in patches less than two hectares. We are standing here with a 20-hectare patch of box gum grassy woodland, it's one of the biggest left in the country. It's a big patch of box gum grassy woodland, okay. So you say that this is only a small patch, it's death by 1,000 cuts, all right? You knock off this, you do it over the whole country, and before you know it this stuff is gone. And every single species that rely on it is gone too.

Di Martin: Background Briefing's co-ordinating producer is Linda McGinness, research by Anna Whitfeld, technical production by Phil McKellar, and Chris Bullock is executive producer. I'm Di Martin.

 

·         Maureen Brannan :

18 Mar 2014 11:23:55am

With the myth of offsetting for the Maules Creek Mine, we have reached the ultimate polarity. After decades of uncontrolled land clearing and other degradations, Theil & Prober stated in 2000 that of the Grassy Whitebox Woodlands ecosystem (representing 400 species) there is now less than 0.1% (that’s LESS THAN ONE THOUSANDTH) of original extent left intact, albeit in tiny isolated fragments. Tony Abbott et al wish to erase that last major fragment (the Leard State Forest) to make room for another coal mine. It cannot possibly become more extreme than that – this government has demonstrated that it will never stop clearing until innumerable species have been pushed into extinction.  And yet the Liberals, the major architects of planetary habitat demise, go from strength to strength in this country and the Greens (the best hope life as we know it has on Earth) have been dumped in Tasmania.  There’s only one avenue left – become self-sufficient in your local community, and protect and maintain your district’s biodiversity yourselves – we must stop ecocidal governments before they destroy any more of our precious endangered ecology.

·         Maureen Brannan :

16 Mar 2014 1:00:33pm

The Qld Government were required to "offset" the 45 kms of unique Gondwana ecosystem that would be inundated by the Mega Dam (later named the PARADISE DAM)they wanted to build in the heart of the Goodnight Scrub National Park - they submitted a few degraded acres of scrappy scrub around the perimeter and this was easily passed in state and federal governments. Here is the Transcript:
"There is no environmental impact in changing lines on a map (to excise the river from the NP so the dam can be built) - the amount of land that is being transferred out is less than the amount that is being transferred in - the quality of the land is of the same set of values." It was in fact nothing even approaching close to the biodiversity values of the critically-endangered riverine ecosystems they consequently destroyed, yet these blatant lies sailed through both State and Federal parliaments unchallenged - they are both guilty of the most egregious form of ECOCIDE.

Extra info from my submission to the House of Representatives Inquiry into Biodiversity loss: Precious Beyond Measure:  I am a lobbyist on behalf of the natural environment and Indigenous peoples and involved in many projects to raise awareness of associated problems and solutions. I work every minute of the day that I am able, including evenings. As the state of our beleaguered planet deteriorates, as more and more animals and entire ecosystems spiral into extinction, the harder I am driven to try and do everything within my power to stop the avoidable destruction of the natural world, focusing mainly on rainforests, predominately in SE Asia where clearing continues  unabated and megadams threaten last intact remnants. The tragedy is that so few people care, and doubly so as it is only those who do care who suffer and grieve with every news report of ecological deterioration. It is incredibly unjust that the burden of caring/responsibility is taken up by so few, and usually always those who are not paid for it! We are all only on Earth for a short while and each of us must do whatever we are able to address the effects of the inevitable warming of  the planet and the sixth great extinction that is already upon us.

 

Peter Beattie was inexplicably able to sail through state and federal Environment Departments,  permission to spend $300 million on building a megadam in the heart of the shire’s (and Australia’s) No.1 biological treasure and tourism asset, the primeval Gondwana jungle remnant known as the 'Goodnight Scrub', paradoxically the oldest and the youngest National Park in Australia. The council had helped stop the last free-flowing stretches of Mighty Murullbakgera, “River of the Breathing Fish, where the Turtle People live” dead in its tracks after flowing through the jungles of Gondwana for 160 million years, inundating not only 45 kilometers of river banks upstream but also ILLEGALLY inundating the rare and unique vegetation along Bowden Creek, the Park’s major waterway. Also gone under still water was the Crossing Place of the Rainbow Serpent Songline at the river (six kilometers of gently dropping rocky river bed rapids, natural riffles that oxygenated the breeding grounds downstream – now under still water) that people had walked since the Dreamtime on  their 2 or 3 yearly migration to the Great Bunya Festival. Also gone, rare ancient zamia palm groves. Even David Attenborough couldn't stop them gutting the NP, removing its heart and annihilating the river’s spirit and Dreaming. (The CSIRO also did all they could to stop it, publishing many articles from scientists in their 'Ecos" Magazine and online)

The at-capacity impoundment of the Paradise Dam has caused a wholesale wiping-out of not just rare but unique biodiversity. There have been three major fish kill events (now 4 since the last floods*) on that stretch of river due to this pristine native vegetation rotting under water. This case of the worst vandalism in Australia history should go to the International Criminal Courts yet NGO Conservation groups can’t even win a minor challenge claiming the fish lift doesn’t work! In any event, Professor Jean Joss, lungfish expert at Macquarie University had always said; “What good is their fish lift anyway? Even if the lungfish negotiate it successfully, and there’s no evidence that they will - their breeding sites upstream (the last intact breeding sites on the river) will all have disappeared if the dam is built.”

The Burnett Water For All Group Statement of Key Issues, under Cultural Heritage for Aboriginal People. states:
The Wakka Wakka Jinda, Gurang Gurang and other groups affirm:
... They would suffer strong spiritual loss, as cultural life is centred around the river, particularly for food. How can this be replaced or valued?
... The Paradise Dam cuts an important traditional pathway (migratory trail/trading route/Rainbow Serpent Songline) which was crossed in the biennial  Bunya Nut Gathering at the Bunya Mountains. (this is at a place called 3 mile rapids, 6 kms of gently falling rocky river beds in the main river channel, the river's major riffle area that oxygenated the water for the lungfish & all other species major breeding grounds in the National Park just downstream - all now destroyed by the Paradise dam .... update 12.3.08)
... According to Mavis Hawkins, president of the Wakka Wakka Jinda group - "We believe in the stories our Elders told us of the sacred places in MURULLBAKGERA , the 'river of the breathing fish’, now known as the Burnett River.  The place where the turtle people lived and bred. (Increase and/or source site) These are special places to us and we do not want to loose them." (Mavis also identified another very significant women's place - a wailing wall for women in the Burnett River gorge - in a letter to editor printed in the Central and Northern Burnett Times.  There are also caves in the gorge which I am sure must have had immense cultural significance - all inundated now)

Mavis' letter: (I've lost the date, but can find it through the Central & Northern Burnett Times):
Aboriginal Views
Its time to stop building the dams and weirs.
We, the indigenous people of this area, are totally against any more  destruction of this land and its natural water systems, or the natural flow of the rivers. WAMP (Burnett Water Allocation and Management Plan) are well aware that we are against any more destruction.
Already there are too many dams and weirs on the Burnett;  water doesn't  flow any more in these parts;  you will drown in the mud, not the water.  Where are the fish going to go?  The Wakka Wakka people called the Burnett  River "Murullbakgera" meaning "rivers of the breathing fish." (does the plural refer to Barambah Creek, the main lungfish breeding tributary to the Burnett River, or its ‘sister’ river, the Mary?)
Another significant Aboriginal legend is that where the turtle people lived there is a wailing wall for Women.
The Burnett and Barambah are places of great respect for our people - they are sacred to us.  It saddens and deeply distresses me when I see the rivers not flowing free.  The government should concentrate more on fixing the roads instead of destroying land and rivers.   

Is the voice of Aboriginal people to be silenced again?
M Hawkins, Gayndah

Very sadly, Mavis died a few months later – probably due to the enormous shock, anxiety and heartbreak of knowing this PRICELESS biological and cultural landscape would be wiped out. This was her last message to the government. The voice of the continent’s Indigenous people was indeed silenced again – Native Title to the river was extinguished, along with its National Park status. The real tragedy here though, was that, to my knowledge, none of the Wakka Wakka Jinda cultural custodians of the river were ever informed that they had a right to apply for protection of all their Dreaming sites under the state or the federal law!* (confirmation from Wakka Wakka Jinda pending) This is a serious breach of due process and will play a major part in any International criminal court procedures.

·         Doomsday Chook :

16 Mar 2014 1:48:10pm

'Off-sets' are a particularly cynical form of greenwashing, and have always been so. Like Environmental Impact Studies that never find against projects, or 'environmental safeguards' like those applied by the odious Hunt to the dumping of dredging waste on the GBR.

·         pete :

16 Mar 2014 1:11:24pm

any offsets or market based systems are always open to manipulation or a way to "trade your way "out of responsibilities and obligations. An architect friend said he can design the unsustainable building but as long as he plants some trees, its ok. offset gives permission for lazy or bad practices. What is needed is actual legislation and massive fines or prison for those who breech it. Sadly, this want please right wing neo liberal small govt, free market loving peeps.