Coal dump plan wont give Reef protection Courier Mail, Brisbane by Brian Williams THE conservation battle to prevent damage to the Great Barrier Reef from expansion of the Abbot Point coal port may have failed. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has warned the Federal Environment Department that the latest plan for dredge spoil dumping on land is likely to be just as damaging as the original plan to dump it at sea. Documents obtained in a Freedom of Information search show that authority general manager Bruce Elliot warned that land dumping was likely to affect the Reef and that work was needed on the dredges sediment plume and land dumping discharges. Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney who proposed the plan to resolve a furore over the original idea to dump 3 million cubic metres of spoil in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area said authority concerns had been met. Mr Seeney said that since Mr Elliots letters were written, thousands of pages of details had been supplied which spelled out that the specialised dredging to be conducted would have far less impact than conventional dredging. Only clean seawater would be returned to the environment from the project which was now reduced to 1.7 million cubic metres of dredging. When the authority approved the original sea dumping it was on the condition that dredging be conducted only between March and June to protect coral spawning and the seagrass growing period. Mr Elliot warned that in Mr Seeneys plan, the dredging window had been extended by four months. Mr Seeney did not respond to questions about the change in dredging times, whether these would be altered to meet scientific concerns or if anything had been proposed to protect seagrass and corals. WWF spokeswoman Louise Matthiesson said much of the information supplied on the project implementation was simply earlier studies. They havent provided any new evidence that would convince us that it is OK to dredge during coral spawning and periods of sea grass growth, she said.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 01:46:35 +0000