Colong Foundation and Blue Mountains Conservation Society representatives, Keith Muir and Madi Maclean, said they welcome the Planning Assessment Commission’s approval of the new water treatment facility at Mt Piper Power Station.
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“It could have come sooner but we just really want them to get on with it and build it as quickly as possible,” president of the Blue Mountains Conservation Society Madi Maclean said.
“We’ve got a long history of making sure the river water is of appropriate quality,” Ms Maclean said.
The end of BMCS’ decade-long battle to stop waste waters flowing into the Coxs River comes, however, with a bitter twist.
A modification to Springvale Mine’s current consent conditions was submitted by Centennial Coal and EnergyAustralia with the water treatment facility plans, which, now approved, will allow Springvale Mine to continue to discharge mine waters into the Coxs River at their current level of salinity until June 2019.
According to consent conditions of the mine’s 2015 extension, Centennial Coal would have had to reduce the salinity of Springvale’s mine waters by a quarter by June 30.
“It means Springvale will be able to function at the same level of pollution for the next two years,” Ms Maclean said.
The Planning Assessment Commission report on the modification estimated that between June 2017-June 2019 the mine will discharge 17,275 tonnes of salt into the catchment.
The report states Centennial Coal provided ample reason for their inability to reduce salinity until the facility is built.
“Furthermore, the applicant has committed to undertaking restoration works in the Coxs River over a 10 year period to compensate for the delay,” the report reads.
If the treatment facility was not approved and Springvale Mine followed water quality consent conditions, the mine would have discharged a total of 27,376 tonnes of salt over its lifetime (until 2028).
The Planning Assessment Commission estimated that the water treatment facility will reduce the salt load discharged over the mine’s life time by 35 per cent.
As a net benefit, PAC found the modification fulfilled water pollution laws, which only allow developments with ‘Neutral or Beneficial’ impact on Sydney’s water catchment.
Keith Muir of the Colong Foundation says outcomes for the catchment would have been better if a water treatment facility was a necessary condition of the mine’s expansion, granted two years ago.
“The mine water treatment project can only remove from the Coxs River a third of the salt and metals discharged by the Springvale mine from now till the end of the mine’s life,” he said.
“Clear directions by the department would have saved a lot of work retrofitting the treatment plant to the mine extension project.”
Six environmental groups, including the Colong Foundation, the BMCS and Lithgow Environment Group supported a case against PAC’s approval of the Springvale Mine expansion because of negative impacts on Sydney’s water catchment. The Land and Environment Court ruled PAC’s decision was legal.
One of those groups, 4Nature, has continued with the case, heard in the Court of Appeal on May 31 of this year. A judgement has not yet been handed down.