25 August 2008 - Australia
— It's a victory for the Whitsunday Islands
and the Great Barrier Reef, with a 20-year
moratorium on all new shale oil projects
in the region. Led by the Save Our Foreshore
group, the success shows just how powerful
local, grassroots campaigns can be.
The ban has been welcomed
by just about everyone but the Queenland
Resource Council, whose proposal was set
to mine millions of tonnes of shale rock
each year on a site just 10 km from the
gateway to the Great Barrier Reef. The shale
oil mine threatened to drain precious water
supplies, and to risk toxic leaching and
air pollution from waste rock. Shale oil
production is extremely greenhouse gas intensive
– emissions from this project, combined
with the company's other planned operations,
would have raised Australia's current total
emissions by 30 percent within 20 years.
This is a great win
but it is madness that such a project could
have even been considered. We are facing
catastrophic climate change – we must urgently
cut emissions, not increase them. We don't
need to endanger the Great Barrier Reef
or anywhere else by mining fossil fuels.
There are better energy sources that are
ready to go right now. If Queensland Premier
Anna Bligh can block this proposal for climate
reasons, we look forward to her blocking
other major fossil fuel projects in the
state, including export coal expansions,
for the same reasons.
Greenpeace joined
Save Our Foreshore in their fight against
the shale oil mine last month when the Esperanza
sailed into Airlie Beach flanked by a flotilla
of 90 local vessels as part of its six-week
energy [r]evolution tour.
