BHP Billiton has released its plan to tunnel for coal underneath the cream of Australia’s cropping land.
The company says agricultural impacts from the Caroona mine will be minimal, but farmers fear the worst for water resources.
The Anglo-Australian miner is one of two to have submitted its plan to the new Mining and Petroleum Gateway panel for assessment, which will advise the Planning and Assessment Commission on Caroona’s agricultural impacts.
The Environmental Impact Statement is expected in early 2015 and, if the approvals system runs to script, construction will begin in 2018.
President of BHP’s energy coal assets in NSW Peter Sharpe said Caroona promised profits during a 30-year plus operation, employing 400 full time mine workers and 600 construction workers – without having a “material impact” on water resources.
But long-term opponent of mining on the Liverpool Plains, farmer and councillor, Tim Duddy, said BHP’s plan broke promises and caused “a massive loss of faith for the community”.
Mr Sharpe said BHP made a significant concession in the Caroona plan, choosing not to pursue open cut mining of the near-surface coal available, and honouring its commitment not to mine underneath floodplain areas.
“We will not open cut anywhere within the project area and we will not mine underground beneath any floodplain area,” Mr Sharpe said.
“The definition of a floodplain (was) provided to us by government as part of our exploration licence conditions.
“We believe, based on that definition, we have submitted a mine plan that does not breach our public commitment.
“It will be up to the regulators and government to decide if we comply or not.”
Mr Sharpe said the 490 megalitres of projected annual inflow the underground mine will generate is “immaterial” when compared with the 2700 megalitres extracted from groundwater each year across the district.
Mr Duddy, however, has a far more negative take on the plan.
He said it revealed areas considered floodplain by farmers would be undermined.
BHP has relied on a “dictionary definition”, ignoring floodplain designations set down in local water sharing plans in NSW’s Water Management Act, he said.
“BHP clearly said they won’t harm agriculture and floodplains, but now we have had a cataclysmic shift.”
Mr Duddy said the patter of impacts to the water resources and productivity of agricultural land in the Hunter Valley would be repeated on the Liverpool Plains.
Chinese miner Shenhua is developing a large scale open cut coal mine several kilometres north of Caroona, at the Watermark coal project.
“BHP can’t say there won’t be any damage to the land,” Mr Duddy said.
“Hunter Valley farmers’ water resources have suffered enormously.
“The companies won’t be employing different mining practice here.
“The impacts will be the same, regardless if it’s environmental or fiscal impacts that happen first.
“It might not hit us in the next five years, but the risk of long term harm is enormous.”
Dictionary definition a dud for Caroona farmer
INACCURATE water data, questions about subsidence and the rehabilitation of farming country need to be addressed before the BHP Billiton’s Caroona mine gets underway.
Local farmers have questioned why the Gateway process isn’t handling the whole application.
Sandy Blomfield, “Colorado”, Caroona, called the process an “absolute shambles”.
“We were led to believe that the Gateway process dealt with everything first but all these different applications – the Gateway process, director general’s requirements and the preliminary agricultural assessments – are running parallel,” said Mr Blomfield.
Landholders have also challenged changes to the original mine plan.
“When this first came about everything was based on five million tonnes of coal each year and now they’re talking 10 million tonnes a year,” Mr Blomfield said.
“They’ve also made a big noise about no open-cut mining on the Liverpool Plains and now it says in the plan they’ve looked at it but don’t envisage open-cut mining.
“How do we know that won’t change in five years?”
The mine plan covers about two-thirds of Mr Blomfield’s 1000-hectare property, which, in a wet season, is inundated with floodwater.
“BHP is refusing to acknowledge our property as floodplain because we’re affected by flooding form the Yarraman Creek, Mooki River and Quirindi Creek but we get inundated from the 7000 acres (2832 hectares) of catchment above us,” Mr Blomfield said.
“There’s gazetted definition of floodplain under the water sharing plan and this is considered a floodplain, but BHP is using a dictionary definition.”
Another concern is that once subsidence from the mine occurs, BHP won’t be around to re-establish the pastures used in the family’s intensive rotation of beef cattle.
“They can’t start restoration until everything’s fully subsided,” Mr Blomfield said.
“The chances of getting pastures to establish is hit and miss at anytime, so it will take much longer to return the country to its original state.”
– RUTH CASKEY