May 2018: Proposed legislative reforms governing mine rehabilitation in Queensland have the potential to stimulate billions of dollars in additional economic activity in Central Queensland and beyond.
A new report shows that forcing mining companies to rehabilitate their mine sites could create at least 4,000 new jobs in north and central Queensland.
Read and download the full report here.
In Central Queensland, the rehabilitation deficit[1] for the ten largest coal mines stands at 51,000 hectares. According to an analysis undertaken by The Australia Institute, setting a target designed to eliminate this deficit over 5 years would generate an estimated 4,250 jobs.
The amount of financial assurance for these ten mines is $1.96 billion meaning that over the 5 year target period it would be expected that the Queensland economy would benefit from an extra $2.5 billion plus in investment, the majority being made in Central Queensland (once assurance discounts are taken into account).
To achieve this the Mineral and Energy Resources (Financial Provisioning) Bill – (MERFP), must be amended to deliver the following:
- Ensuring that all land disturbed by mining activities is rehabilitated to a safe and stable landform that does not cause environmental harm and is able to sustain an approved post-mining land use, meaning the prohibition of un-rehabilitated voids and requiring that all mines are returned to the approximate original contour.
- Ensuring progressive rehabilitation milestones in the proposed compulsory progressive rehabilitation and closure plans (PRCPs) for all mines are set to eliminate the current rehabilitation deficit in the coal industry over 5 years.
Read and download the full report here.
[1] Rehabilitation deficit refers to the gap between the total area on a mine site disturbed by mining and the rehabilitation of disturbance to date. In order to minimise taxpayer and environmental risk, the State should strive for a situation where for every hectare disturbed, a hectare is rehabilitated – an effective disturbed area to rehabilitation ratio of 1:1. This does not include the operational area and infrastructure required by the mine to extract the resource which is negotiated and set as the maximum area of permitted disturbance.