The Northern Territory Government has quietly made sweeping changes that weaken fracking regulations and threaten worker and community safety, say community groups.
The changes to the Code of Practice: Onshore Petroleum Activities in the Northern Territory were revealed in the latest issue of the Northern Territory Gazette. There was no public consultation before the changes were revealed and they appear to have been made in secret.
The changes, visible as “strike throughs”, include:
-
The opening reference to one purpose of the code being “the risk to the public and workers is managed to a level as low as reasonably practicable (ALARP) and acceptable” has been removed.
-
The requirement that “The name, type and quantity of each chemical used on each well throughout the well construction process must be recorded” has been removed.
-
Much of the methane “leak management, detection and repair” prescriptions have been removed. Detecting and acting swiftly on methane leaks is an environmental issue, but equally a safety issue.
Meanwhile, at a federal level, Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek is yet to apply expanded water trigger protections to any fracking project in the Northern Territory, despite applying it to a similarly sized fracking project in Western Australia last month.
Frack Free NT spokesperson Pete Callender said, “These secretive changes have stripped crucial safeguards from fracking laws which were not even strong enough to start with.
“The NT Government has repeatedly assured Territorians that we have world class petroleum regulations. These changes make a mockery of those claims.”
Arid Lands Environment Centre spokesperson Hannah Ekin said, “The Finocchiaro Government is waging a war on community safety at the behest of the fracking industry.
“The new code has weakened protections for workers and weakened protections against experimental chemicals and experimental drilling techniques.
“The impression on reading the new code is of an industry freed to experiment with chemical compounds, mixed by people under circumstances where their safety is not considered.
“The fracking industry has been given free rein to bypass safety and effectively conduct experiments with dangerous chemicals in remote areas with little independent scrutiny or transparency. It’s a recipe for disaster.”
ENDS