Regional residents have expressed outrage at the NSW government’s decision to open up vast areas of the state to gas extraction, warning it puts communities, water and agriculture at risk.
The NSW government has announced it will open up the Bancannia and Pondie Range Troughs for gas exploration applications, while slashing the application fee from $50,000 to $1000.
Liverpool Plains farmer Margaret Fleck said: "This is a disastrous backflip from the NSW government, which had in 2021 listened to community concerns about gas drilling and decided to block exploration in the far west.
"Farmers in NSW’s northwest have been fighting Santos’ Narrabri gas project for over a decade, because we refuse to see prime farmland and water sacrificed for short-term gas extraction.
"The NSW Labor government will be throwing regional communities under the bus if it buckles to industry pressure by handing out gas licences like candy. These wells would permanently scar NSW’s land and water sources for generations."
Lock the Gate Alliance’s Clean Industry Coordinator Harriet Kater said: "The current volatility in global markets is an emergency siren to NSW – we shouldn’t be locking our economy further onto expensive fossil fuels like gas.
"Just last month a broad coalition of unions and community organisations called on the NSW Government to commit to an economy-wide gas reduction plan, which would make energy more affordable, protect and create manufacturing jobs and improve community health. Today’s announcement takes us in the opposite direction.
"New research shows that 74% of gas use in NSW could be replaced with commercially available technology, such as electrification and heat pumps, and that a 52% gas reduction target by 2035 is achievable for the state.
"The NSW government has a real opportunity to invest in a stable and affordable clean energy future, but instead it is pandering to the gas industry.
"The recent Net Zero Commission’s expert advice for the NSW Net Zero Plan for 2035 was that we need to accelerate the electrification of NSW industry and buildings to meet our legislated emissions reduction targets."
ENDS
Further reading
Broad coalition calls for economy-wide plan to slash NSW gas use (March 2026)
A Springmount Advisory report from March this year found that 74% of gas use in NSW could be replaced with commercially available technology, such as electrification and heat pumps, and a 52% gas reduction target by 2035 is achievable for the state.
Advice for the Net Zero Plan to 2035.
Background
In July 2021, the former NSW Coalition Government released its gas policy, which specifically ruled out gas exploration in the same areas of Far West NSW near Wilcannia and Broken Hill that were just ruled back in by Chris Minns. In 2021, the government cited “ongoing land use conflict in areas subject to gas exploration” as a reason not to release the area for gas exploration.