A new economic analysis reveals how giving companies the right to frack for unconventional gas in Queensland’s fragile Lake Eyre Basin would be the “absolute height of folly” due to the climate impacts and predicted high costs.
The Pegasus Economics report, commissioned by Lock the Gate Alliance, shows any fracking projects in Qld’s Lake Eyre Basin would be high cost, high emissions, and likely to rapidly become stranded assets.
It also reveals:
- Unconventional gas produced from the Cooper Basin in the Lake Eyre Basin will be neither low cost nor low emissions.
- Any requirement to offset emissions from the production of unconventional gas from the Cooper Basin in the Lake Eyre Basin will further erode its competitiveness given the high CO2 content of raw gas.
- Rather than pose the risk of becoming stranded assets, the commercial production of unconventional gas from the Lake Eyre Basin would be the absolute height of folly if it were ever to be commenced