Australia. Climate Change activists step up opposition to coal in Hunter Valley protests from mine to port

A ban­ner drop at a con­struc­tion site for a new coal loader ter­mi­nal at the Port of New­cas­tle in the New South Wales Hunter Val­ley end­ed when police instruct­ed the 60 metre crane be low­ered to the ground.

A ban­ner drop at a con­struc­tion site for a new coal loader ter­mi­nal at the Port of New­cas­tle in the New South Wales Hunter Val­ley end­ed when police instruct­ed the 60 metre crane be low­ered to the ground. The Pro­tes­tors say they were not giv­en warn­ing of this action and alledged it imper­iled their lives.

“We are dis­mayed with the actions of police here today.” said spokesper­son Steve Phillips. “We con­duct­ed a peace­ful protest, with trained and expe­ri­ence climbers, and safe­ty as our pri­or­i­ty. NSW Police respond­ed with gross neg­li­gence and dere­lic­tion of duty, and placed two lives at risk. Our climbers were not even warned before the crane was low­ered.”

Coal Export Terminal construction obstructed

Activists entered the NCIG coal ter­mi­nal site in New­cas­tle before dawn to peace­ful­ly stop con­struc­tion of new coal port facil­i­ties. Two expe­ri­enced climbers scaled the 60 metre high con­struc­tion crane to unfurl a ban­ner read­ing “Stop the coal rush! For health, water & cli­mate.”

The two activists were both arrest­ed and charged with ‘enter enclosed land’. They have now been released and will appear in New­cas­tle local court on 9th Octo­ber. Both activists have been report­ed as safe and well, and are hap­py with the protest today which stopped work on the coal port ter­mi­nal site for two hours.

The protest was the fourth con­sec­u­tive stop-work action against NSW coal projects this week. Activists tar­get­ed expan­sions of the three major ele­ments of the coal chain – mines, rail­way, and port infra­struc­ture – to high­light the mas­sive expan­sion of coal min­ing and infra­struc­ture tak­ing place in NSW, and its impacts on pub­lic health and the envi­ron­ment.

“NSW is in the grip of a coal rush. Pub­lic health, water­ways, ecosys­tems, and the glob­al cli­mate are under assault,” said Steve Phillips. “Local com­mu­ni­ties are resist­ing the coal rush at every step of the way, chal­leng­ing new mines and port devel­op­ments that place the prof­its of coal com­pa­nies ahead of the pub­lic good.”

Accord­ing to Ris­ing Tide New­cas­tle who organ­ised today’s protest there are 34 coal mine pro­pos­als cur­rent­ly before the NSW Plan­ning Depart­ment, most of which would pro­duce coal for export through New­cas­tle. New­cas­tle is the largest coal export port in the world, and the port ter­mi­nal expan­sion will add 66 mil­lion tonnes per year export capac­i­ty if allowed to go ahead. In 2004, port through­put was around 78 mil­lion tonnes, or 10 per cent of the world’s total trade in coal

“But both State and Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ments have tak­en the side of the coal com­pa­nies. NSW Plan­ning Min­is­ter Brad Haz­zard and Fed­er­al Envi­ron­ment Min­is­ter Tony Burke con­tin­ue to approve every coal project that arrives on their desks. Com­mu­ni­ties are cry­ing out for help, but gov­ern­ments are ignor­ing them.”

 

“Enough is enough. We need to stop the coal rush. It’s time for State and Fed­er­al gov­ern­ments to stop kow­tow­ing to the min­ing com­pa­nies, and get behind com­mu­ni­ty demands for a clean, renew­able future.”

A spokesper­son for Ris­ing Tide New­cas­tle said the actions of police today which imper­iled the lives of two activists will be report­ed to the NSW Ombuds­man.

 

Coal Crusher occupied at Boggabri coal mine

On Mon­day two activists did a ban­ner drop in cen­tral New South Wales, where activists scaled a coal-crush­ing plant at Bog­gabri Coal Mine on the Gunnedah basin.

Accord­ing to a media release by the pro­tes­tors the NSW Gov­ern­ment has recent­ly approved a four­fold expan­sion of the Bog­gabri Coal Mine. The two pro­tes­tors dropped a ban­ner say­ing: “Stop the Coal Rush: Pro­tect Health, Water, Cli­mate”. After more than 8 hours atop the coal-crush­er two pro­tes­tors were arrest­ed and tak­en to Narrabri Police Sta­tion. The men were protest­ing against the destruc­tion of Leard State For­est, in the Gunnedah Basin, for three open-cut coal mines. A major expan­sion of the Bog­gabri coal mine was approved by the NSW Gov­ern­ment in July despite com­mu­ni­ty and envi­ron­men­tal organ­i­sa­tions alledg­ing huge eco­log­i­cal impacts and over­whelm­ing com­mu­ni­ty oppo­si­tion.

At the same time on Mon­day activists from Quit Coal dropped a huge ban­ner over the the Vic­to­ri­an State Par­lia­ment entrance say­ing ‘Coal is the sin­gle great­est threat to civil­i­sa­tion and all life on our plan­et’ Prof. James Hansen, NASA. Why is Bail­lieu fund­ing coal?”

Tripod stops construction on coal railtrack expansion

Between today’s protest and the protest at Bog­gabri coal mine Ris­ing Tide New­cas­tle also protest­ed on Tues­day the upgrad­ing of rail infra­struc­ture and build­ing a third track in the Hunter Val­ley to increase the load capac­i­ty for export­ing more coal.

The Mait­land to Min­im­bah Third Track project is being con­struct­ed by Hunter 8 Alliance, which is a con­sor­tium of engi­neer­ing com­pa­ny GHD, con­struc­tion com­pa­ny John Hol­land, and the Fed­er­al­ly owned Aus­tralian Rail Track Cor­po­ra­tion. The project aims to lift coal haulage capac­i­ty on the Hunter rail cor­ri­dor to 200 mil­lion tonnes per annum. It includes con­struc­tion of 23km of new rail track, and recon­di­tion­ing of 9km of exist­ing track. The Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ment grant­ed $114 mil­lion, through the ARTC, to the project.

Activists accessed a Hunter 8 Alliance site at Ruther­ford and erect­ed a wood­en tri­pod to block access to the site. Activist Ned Haughton scaled the 10 metre high struc­ture, where he remained for the next five and a half hours. Haughton was arrest­ed and charged with obstruc­tion.

Steve Phillips, spokesper­son for protest organ­is­ers Ris­ing Tide, said: “This rail­way con­struc­tion project is designed pure­ly for the ben­e­fit of coal cor­po­ra­tions, yet it is being paid for with tax­pay­ers mon­ey. Why are tax­pay­ers dol­lars being hand­ed over to rich min­ing cor­po­ra­tions, in order to prop up a pol­lut­ing indus­try that is destroy­ing human health and the envi­ron­ment?”

 

“There is a coal rush under way in NSW, and pub­lic health, water­ways, ecosys­tems, and the glob­al cli­mate are under assault. Mas­sive coal mine projects, coal haulage projects, and coal port projects are in the pipeline. If all these projects go ahead, the con­se­quences will be dev­as­tat­ing.” con­clud­ed Steve Phillips. “We call on State and Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ments to aban­don their infat­u­a­tion with min­ing com­pa­nies, and their addic­tion to fos­sil fuels. It’s time to take a stand and stop this coal rush before it’s too late.”

Sources: