In Sydney an anti coal seam gas protest was organized outside the venue of a minerals conference being hosted by the State Government. Despite one third of natural gas in Australia coming from coal seams there are grave environmental concerns over the mining process called fracking by which it is extracted.
CSG helps generate electricity with a reduced Carbon dioxide emission. It is 70% less carbon dioxide when compared with electricity produced by coal. The coal seam gas industry has created more than 18,000 regional jobs and had a $ 45 billion committment in the country.
However the Australian Greens and other environmentalists are not too happy with the new industry as its long term impacts on the environment are not well defined. Senator Larissa Waters of the Greens from Queensland said that a moratorium was needed banning the mining of CSG till the full impacts of coal seam gas mining were understood.
The Australian Greens have the support of a farmer and community group called Lock the Gate Alliance. The president of Lock the Gate, Drew Hutton said that the precautionary principle has not been applied with regard to coal seam gas. He added that it was an entirely new industry and they simply didn't know what impacts, social and environmental, it was going to have.
Source: Lock The Gate