AN exemption that protects the coal mining industry from a NSW Government “polluter pays” licensing scheme should be removed to improve the state’s air quality, says Lock the Gate Alliance.
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The group called on Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton to include coal mining in the state’s “load-based licensing scheme”, after the proposal was raised in an Environment Protection Authority report in 2016, and was considered at a NSW Government Clean Air Summit on Tuesday.
The NSW Minerals Council has strongly rejected expansion of load-based licensing to include coal mining, after the EPA report found all man-made particulate emissions in the Upper Hunter needed to be reduced by 50 per cent to meet new Australian air quality standards. It revealed that Muswellbrook and Singleton won’t meet the new standards that were set in December, 2015.
Load-based licensing was introduced in 1999 so that companies pay part of their licence fees based on the load of pollutants their activities release to the environment.
In a submission to the EPA after release of the Clean Air for NSW report, Lock the Gate said the state was missing out on $14 million each year while coal mining is exempt from the licensing scheme.
The Clean Air Summit heard speakers on the broad issues of coal and related industry emissions, wood-fired emissions and transport emissions.
Speakers included Glencore environment and climate change manager John Watson, Delta Energy environment manager Bryan Beudeker, Bulga resident and Upper Hunter air quality advisory committee member John Krey and NSW Minerals Council representative David Frith.
Lock the Gate Hunter coordinator Steve Phillips said while the Clean Air for NSW report was clear about what action the NSW Government needed to take after new Australian air quality standards lowered the levels of admissible PM10 and PM2.5 particulate emissions, the summit agenda did not even mention load-based licensing.
“There really isn’t a good reasons for mining not to be included in the scheme, apart from the fact that the mining industry doesn’t want to be included,” Mr Phillips said.
“We want the government to expand the scheme and make the fees high enough so the coal industry reduces the air pollution.”
In a report on submissions received after the Clean Air for NSW report, the EPA said industry submissions claimed applying load-based licensing to mining would be complex, inefficient and largely ineffective in reducing emissions.
“Some industry submissions view the attention to coal mining and transport emissions as disproportionate and argue for greater focus on wood heater emissions, given the significant contribution of wood smoke to air pollution in NSW,” the EPA said.
In its 2016 report the EPA said modelling showed the new PM2.5 standard was “unlikely to be attained in Singleton and Muswellbrook into the future as coal production in the Hunter Valley is expected to continue to increase”.
It said all man-made particulate emissions, including from wood-burning domestic heaters, needed to be reduced by 50 per cent to meet the new standards.