According to the Queensland Environmental Defenders Office, the term “vital infrastructure” traditionally solely referred to necessary construction projects.
The Indian Adani power plant. This project was evaluated more quickly than other large-scale coordinated projects in Queensland, according to the Environmental Defenders Office.
According to fresh findings, the Queensland government handed Adani’s planned Carmichael project extraordinary powers.
For the first time, a legal examination by Queensland’s Environmental Defenders Office has shown that the extensive powers previously applied only to critical endeavours.
He named the Carmichael mine a “prescriptive project” and “essential infrastructure” on October 7, the state minister for natural resources and mining.
Since the State Development and Public Works Organization Act of 2006 included provisions allowing for the declaration of vital infrastructure, only a small number of sites have been designated. Water supply is a major theme in four of the five cases.
Because of an extreme drought in southeast Queensland in 2007, the former infrastructure minister deemed elements of the water system essential infrastructure.
For the Adani Carmichael integrated project, the use of a declaration authority was deemed “very inappropriate” by Jo-Anne Bragg, chief executive of the Environmental Defenders Office Queensland.
According to Lynham, at the time of the announcement, “This is a crucial initiative.” It’s a priority for the government, and they want to make it happen. This region of central and northern Queensland needs employment.
Legal decisions that must be made in order to go forward with a project may be taken over by the coordinator general, with the approval of the minister, under the statute controlling essential infrastructure.
Opportunities for the community to examine the effects of the project on groundwater may be restricted at that point in time for the community.
Any judgments made by the coordinator general will be subject to review by the Queensland courts, who have lost their ordinary statutory powers.
The essential infrastructure label “may be utilised to possibly short-circuit legal protection for key groundwater supplies,” according to Bragg.
While Adani’s use of this provision has been questioned, “we feel this might open the floodgates to all kinds of private ventures requesting to be fast-tracked through the evaluation process,” she added.
This is what she recommended: to reassure Queenslanders that correct process would be followed going forward, state officials should rescind both declarations; they should also revise State Development Act to limit future coordinator general powers.
This project was evaluated more quickly than other large-scale coordinated projects in Queensland, according to the Environmental Defenders Office.
While it is common to see lengthy delays between the submission of a proponent’s statement of intent and the release of the coordinator general report, the typical duration between these two events is four to five years.
Carmichael was completed in little over three and a half years after Adani submitted its original declaration of intent to begin construction.
“Despite the Adani mine’s size and effect, the plan has cleared the process in less time than an average similar project,” Bragg said.
Our unique and irreplaceable groundwater resources demand that the government not yield to industry pressure and instead guarantee they are adequately scrutinised.
The office of Senator Lynham has been approached to get an opinion on the matter.
