New South Wales is getting tough new rules for the coal seam gas (CSG) mining industry. The moratorium is to deal with the controversial ‘fracking’ process that is used in the coal seam gas mining industry. They hope to ban the use of certain toxic chemicals that are a part of the process.
The resources and energy minister for New South Wales, Chris Hartcher made the statement about the new restrictions for coal seam gas mining, as a 60 day moratorium on new exploration licenses came to an end last week.
There will be detailed community consultation and environmental condition studies carried out for the coal and the coal seam gas industry hence forth. There will also be changes in the industry’s use of water and the use of evaporation ponds in the coal seam gas operations is also being banned.
In case the mining company needs to extract more than 3 million litres of water in a year from ground water sources, it will need to get a special water license. Mr Hartcher said that a balance was needed between the demands for agricultural land and mining.
The President of the NSW Farmers Association, Fiona Simson said that little progress has been made to understand the impact of this relatively new industry, and the best legislative and regulatory mechanisms to police it. Wilderness Society and the Nature Conservation Council of NSW, said that there is little fracking planned for the next six months. So all of the other impacts won't be addressed by this ban.
The NSW Minerals Council on the other hand welcomed the new rules and said that communities and land-holders shouldn't be caught by surprise simply because they have missed an advertisement about a new exploration licence at the back of a local paper.