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Clean Futures Collective Better active today than radioactive tomorrow! |
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Above the Law? (continued) Environmental Protection At 2006 levels of operation, the Roxby Downs/Olympic Dam uranium mine is licensed to take 40 million litres of water a day from the Great Artesian Basin (GAB). The GAB is a vast and ancient body of water that lies deep under the surface of central Australia. It begins in far north Queensland and is a source of water for many pastoral properties and habitats, including the fragile and unique mound springs in South Australia’s arid north. Currently BHP Billiton extracts 33 million litres a day from the GAB and farmers, environmentalists and traditional owners have reported dramatic reductions in water pressure threatening and sometimes extinguishing rare ecosystems. Under the Indenture Act, BHP Billiton is not required to pay for this water. The radioactive waste tailings dam at Olympic Dam amounts to 60 million tonnes and is growing at 10 million tonnes annually. The tailings dam has been plagued by spills – most significantly in 1994, when the mine operators admitted some five million cubic litres had leaked from the dams over two years. Environmental audits provided to the Rann Government continue to emphasise that the mine tailings are inadequately managed and “an issue of real concern” requiring “the implementation of urgent remedial measures”. BHP Billiton has no long-term plans for the management of these tailings, which because of their radioactivity may remain dangerous for thousands of years. When all valuable resources have been extracted BHP Billiton simply plans to ‘cap’ the tailings dump with soil. Additionally, Olympic Dam consumes more electricity than any other body in the State, ten percent of the state’s production, effectively making it SA’s single biggest producer of greenhouse gas. This impact will only increase with the mine’s projected expansion. The Indenture Act provides an override to the Environmental Protection Act 1993 (EPA) and the powers and functions contained within. The EPA was enacted to provide for the protection of the environment and the establishment of an Environmental Protection Authority to monitor and enforce compliance with the Act. The key objective of this legislation is the avoidance of ‘environmental harm’, a term that is defined in the legislation to mean any harm or potential harm to the environment, of whatever degree or duration. Potential harm includes risk of harm and future harm. The legislation imposes different penalties for offences causing environmental harm. The most heavily penalised offence is the offence of causing serious environmental harm by polluting the environment intentionally or recklessly and with knowledge that serious environmental harm will or might result. A lower penalty is imposed where a person, by polluting the environment, causes serious environmental harm. The Environmental Protection Authority is charged with enforcing these provisions. The Authority has the power to: · Serve notices on people violating the EPA and order them to comply. · Place conditions on licences and other environmental approvals. · Impose or vary a condition of an environmental authorisation. · Demand financial assurance to be made where there is a high risk that operation will result in environmental harm. This money is used to counteract resulting environmental or community damage. Require an organization to prepare a plan of action in the event of emergencies that might arise out of the operation. These provisions are South Australia’s most important and strongest environmental safeguards and they are absent from BHP Billitons Olympic Dam operation. In fact, under the Indenture, Primary Industries and Resources South Australia (PIRSA), is responsible for overseeing the project’s environmental standards. As a government body dedicated to promoting mining, PIRSA has a clear conflict of interest in this role. Friends of the Earth Campaigner Sophie Green notes: Whether you support the mining operations at Olympic Dam or not commonsense dictates that where a massive project is being undertaken which has the potential (and indeed likelihood) of damaging vast portions of the environment, our strongest environmental safeguards should apply. We are only asking that BHP Billiton be held to the same standard as every other corporation in Australia. In reviewing the conditions surrounding the massive 1994 leak, Dr. Gavin Mudd emphasises that the Indenture Act essentially prevents the mine from environmental responsibility and “until the [Indenture] Act is revoked entirely there can be no truly independent, external environmental assessment of the impacts of Olympic Dam”. Legal accountability and guarantees of BHP Billiton’s environmental performance are crucial, particularly in light of the proposed expansion of the Olympic Dam mine into the largest open cut mine in the world. The scale of this operation and the associated risks threaten damage to the environment on a scale we have not yet seen. Ms Green notes, Our Government is playing a dangerous balancing game with promises on one hand and contrary legislative action on the other. Actions speak louder than words and its time we demanded more from our representatives. Take action With BHP Billiton seeking a four-fold expansion of their Roxby Downs/Olympic Dam uranium mine and the Indenture Act due to come up for review in the next 18 months, now is a crucial time to act for government and corporate accountability. Write to Premier Mike Rann and the ministers listed below to express your concern about BHP Billiton’s legal privileges and urge them to amend the Indenture Act. Use the form letter below as a guide. … Dear Mr. Rann, I’m writing to express my deep concern regarding the legal immunity granted to BHP Billiton’s Olympic Dam mine through the Roxby Downs (Indenture Ratification) Act 1982. While I welcome your commitment to the “strictest environmental standards” for Roxby Downs, such standards cannot be guaranteed while BHP Billiton’s operations at Olympic Dam are given precedence over the Freedom of Information Act 1991, the Environment Protection Act 1993, the Natural Resources Act 2004 (including the Water Resources Act 1997) and the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1988, among others. Furthermore, by allowing Primary Industries and Resources South Australia (PIRSA) to oversee the mine’s environmental standards is unacceptable. PIRSA exists primarily to promote mining in this state and therefore has a serious conflict of interest. Environmental oversight should be granted to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) and other independent regulatory bodies. The most certain way to ensure the “strictest environmental standards” for BHP Billiton’s Olympic Dam mine, and the transparency to maintain them, is to make the mine subject to the same laws and responsibilities as every other corporation in Australia. I seriously urge you to repeal the Roxby Downs (Indenture Ratification) Act 1982 and to push for the removal of the conflict of interest in PIRSA’s responsibilities for environmental oversight of mining operations. Yours sincerely, … Premier Mike Rann GPO Box 2343, Adelaide SA 5001 Phone: 08 8463 3166 Hon. Paul Holloway Minister for Mineral Resources Development Parliament House Adelaide SA 5000 Hon. Gail Gago Minister for the Environment and Conservation Parliament House Adelaide SA 5000 Hon. Jay Weatherill Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation GPO Box 2269, Adelaide SA 5001 Phone: 8303 2926 Hon. Iain Evans Leader of the Opposition Shadow Minister for Sustainability and Climate Change 1/7-9 Young Street, Blackwood SA 5051 Phone: 8278 5844 Hon. David Ridgway MLC Shadow Minister for Environment and Conservation Parliament House, Adelaide SA 5000 Mitch Williams Shadow Minister for Mineral Resource Development Shadow Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation 30 Ormerod Street, Naracoorte, 5271 Friends of the Earth Adelaide’s Clean Futures Collective is committed to promoting intelligent, socially and environmentally sustainable alternatives to the nuclear and fossil fuel industries. If you’d like to know more about this or other campaigns, contact Friends of the Earth Adelaide at [email protected], [email protected] or (08) 8227 1399. References 1 Noonan, D 2006, personal communication, 30 March 2006 2 Government of South Australia, ‘Citizens Right to Information’, accessed 1 May 2006, http://www.archives.sa.gov.au/system/foi.html 3 Catchlove, J 2006, personal communication, 7 April 2006. 4 Catchlove, J 2006, personal communication, 7 April 2006. 5 Bachmann, H 2002, ‘Reporting Independent Review of Reporting Procedures for the SA Uranium Mining Industry, August 2002, p. 1 6 Wiese Bockmann, M 2006, ‘Waste fears at uranium mine’, The Australian, 10 March 2006, p. 7 7 Green, S 2006, personal communication, 7 April 2006. 8 Mudd, G 1997, ‘SA Parliamentary Inquiry into the Tailings System Leakage’, Sea-US, accessed 11 May 2006, http://www.sea-us.org.au/roxby/sa-inquiry.html < Back to Page 1: Aboriginal Heritage and Freedom of Information |
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Last updated 23 May 2006 |