PIPELINE RESISTANCE: Landholders ramp up fight against Australian Pipeline Authority
Farmer says they don’t trust APA
FOURTH-generation farmer Simon Fagan has been fighting to stop the development of the coal seam gas industry in the Northwest Plains area for six years.
The cattle and grain farmer runs more than 4000 hectares at Coonamble in northwest New South Wales.
His family has been on the land for 115 years.
In January last year, the Australian Pipeline Authority announced the Western Slopes Pipeline to connect a new source of gas from the proposed Narrabri Gas Project to the NSW gas transmission network via the Moomba Sydney Pipeline.
Mr Fagan’s property sits on the proposed route.
“The pipeline is one part of it we are concerned about,” Mr Fagan said.
“At the forefront of our concerns is the establishment of coal seam gas in New South Wales, which we are strongly against.
“And the protection of our water. It’s still a new industry and some results have already been damaging in relation to water.
“Once it occurs, it can’t be reversed, so our main aim is to not allow the infrastructure to be put in place for the industry to be developed in the first place.”
Mr Fagan said the Great Artesian Basin Protection Group, of which he is a member, had been fighting against CSG companies for six years regarding the Pilliga coal seam gas project.
“At one stage we thought it had nearly fallen over as it was proving to be unviable,” he said.
“But now there’s a proposal for 850-odd wells in the Pilliga Forest.
“84 wells have been drilled under an exploration licence and only 24 are viable.
“NSW still has a moratorium on fracking. We can’t see why the project should go ahead.”
Mr Fagan said the Pilliga State Forest was an important water source for landholders in the area and, with 850 gas wells proposed in the forest, their water supply would be impacted.
Last month the APA had scheduled a community consultation meeting to be held in Coonamble about the Western Slopes Pipeline project.
420 community members attended, however APA did not.
“For a cancelled meeting, it was an amazing outcome,” Mr Fagan said.
“As a community we asked our questions. We had our legal representative from Sydney in attendance; she was able to answer some land access questions.
“But there’s still a lot of questions we need the APA to answer.
“It’s a shame they weren’t there. They have since sent out letters saying they would like to meet individually with people. I feel they have a divide-and-conquer mentality.”
At the Coonamble meeting those in attendance came up with what they call the Coonamble motions:
■ MOTION ONE: The rural communities including the towns, villages and farming communities totally reject the Santos CSG Pilliga project and all associated industries and will stand together to vehemently oppose this using all possible options to protect the water. Carried unanimously.
■ MOTION TWO: There will be no individual meetings with affected landholders or the Aboriginal community. We will only hold meetings in the presence of the community. Carried unanimously.
■ MOTION THREE: The Coonamble and wider community, after holding a meeting on December 6, 2017, have unanimously shown support that the GAB (Great Artesian Basin) is too important to be put at risk and the APA pipeline will be blocked at any cost. Carried unanimously.
Mr Fagan said he believed the APA were trying to intimidate landowners by only wanting to deal with them one on one.
“That way they can tell us whatever they want and it’s our word against theirs,” he said.
Late last year Mr Fagan shot a video of interactions
between the APA and landowners. He had posted it on Facebook, but it was reported and removed.
“There is other footage showing APA trying to get a landowner to go away from the group of people to talk with them by themselves,” he said.
“The APA group had showed up at properties, with security guards.” Mr Fagan has since reposted this footage to Facebook. Mr Fagan said the APA needed to win the community over, instead of trying to run over the top of them and break down a few landowners in private meetings.
“The Aboriginal community have also been shunned. They were told they didn’t matter because they weren’t landowners,” he said.
“We’ve seen what’s taken place in southwest Queensland – they didn’t know what was coming.
“That’s why we have a busy little Great Artesian Basin Protection Group who are organised. We will request APA has a meeting with the community, but we don’t believe they will agree to it.”
Despite the proposed route being in the works since January 2017, Mr Fagan’s first contact with the APA was in August. He then approached their stall at AgQuip.
“I told them their approach to landowners at that stage was appalling,” he said.
“They had phone numbers wrong. They had my neighbour and I listed under the same number.
“It was obviously just a tick-box process, saying they had contacted landowners and hadn’t had any response.
“We don’t trust them. We don’t think they are concerned at all about the community.”
Mr Fagan said landowners didn’t get a say in the location of the proposed easement for the pipeline.
“The easement will have a weight restriction on it because it’s a high-pressure pipeline,” he said.
“We’re being told it will be a 30-tonne weight limit, but in other areas it’s only four tonnes.
“It makes it hard to operate if the easement divides a farm.”
Mr Fagan said he had asked why the pipeline wouldn’t follow stock routes, only to be told they all ran in the wrong direction.
“There’s definitely more to the story and the pipeline is going where they want it. It’s uncanny how it runs parallel to the Dubbo-Tamworth line.”
Rural Weekly approached APA for comment, however at the time of publication, hadn’t received a response.
If you are affected by the project you can send a letter to the editor to candyce.braithwaite @ruralweekly.com.au.