Good news! Kawasaki have announced that they will do marine pest monitoring pre-and-post hydrogen trial. This is a response to a letter of request initiated by WPPC and jointly signed by 8 environment groups and our follow up work including the grant awarded to us and Save Westernport applied for by Julia, Karri and Chris Chandler. This grant was from Greg Hunt's Office.
The grant awarded by Federal government to WPPC and Save Westernport will now be used for a snapshot to determine the presence/ absence of marine pets at Stony Point. We'll keep you updated on the progress. Read their response here:
Marine Pest Monitoring Community Response Letter[5208].pdf
The grant awarded by Federal government to WPPC and Save Westernport will now be used for a snapshot to determine the presence/ absence of marine pets at Stony Point. We'll keep you updated on the progress. Read their response here:
Marine Pest Monitoring Community Response Letter[5208].pdf
The Otama Submarine is listing in Hastings waters. It has on board batteries as big as a small car.
WPPC strongly urge The Oberon Association to sign over ownership to Parks Vic so they can take measures to protect The Bay. The Western port Oberon Association has failed to attract enough money to turn the submarine into a tourist attraction and has plenty of years. We do not want the submarine on land if it isn't a mueseum. It may become a great reef for marine ecology once made safe and sunk.
July 2021
Dear Karri,
Thank you for your letter regarding marine pest monitoring. HESC Project Partners take the community’s concern about the threat of marine pests in the Westernport Bay area seriously. We have been and continue to take actions to address this concern. I am writing on behalf of all project partners to address several points raised in your letter. Marine Pest Monitoring Kawasaki Heavy Industry (KHI) will conduct marine pest monitoring at BlueScope Jetty before the arrival of the Suiso Frontier between October 2021 and March 2022. To this end, KHI is assessing the work required for marine pest monitoring in the area and is in preliminary discussions with a CSIRO-recommended marine monitoring company to undertake the work As requested, a scope of work is also being developed with the marine monitoring company for ongoing monitoring for an appropriate period after the last ship departs Western Port Bay. Ballast Water In the pilot phase, as the amount of hydrogen to be loaded onto the ship is small, we do not anticipate that any ballast water will be released. In the case of an emergency, a water treatment facility is installed on the ship to ensure ballast water is treated prior to being released. This treatment neutralises chlorine, which won’t be released into the sea water. This will prevent the spread of foreign marine species to the Port of Hastings. Furthermore, the Suiso Frontier will comply with the Australian Government’s Australian Ballast Water Management Requirements (ABWMR). The latest requirements of the ABWMR reflects the implementation of the Ballast Water Convention and includes new national domestic ballast water requirements to reduce the risk of spreading marine pests that have already established in Australian seas. Complying with the ABWMR ensures: • Every vessel carries a valid ballast water management plan • All vessels must carry a valid International Ballast Water management certificate • Vessels with a ballast water management system (BWMS) must carry a Type Approval Certificate specific to the type of Ballast Water Management System (BWMS) installed • All vessels must maintain a complete and accurate record of all ballast water movements. Commercial operation in Hastings There will be no dredging of Westernport Bay for the HESC Pilot. We have not decided a port suitable for a commercial stage HESC Project and a decision to progress to commercialisation will be made after the pilot project is completed. Whichever Port location is considered, HESC will take steps to identify and mitigate local issues, including environmental ones, by listening to local concerns and the voices of experts here and internationally. We recognise that Westernport Bay is a precious marine habitat. We can assure you that if HESC proceeds to commercialisation the regulatory approvals process provides an integrated and transparent assessment of the proposed project and its impacts.We have a vision for a sustainable energy future. HESC believes that as we transition to this future, clean hydrogen produced from Latrobe Valley coal with carbon capture and storage will be able to reduce significant amounts of atmospheric CO2, meet projected hydrogen demand and maintain affordability. The critical infrastructure, sustainable jobs, and in-demand skills HESC creates are all crucial ingredients for renewable hydrogen projects. We hope this information helps to clarify some matters and extend an invite for another virtual briefing session soon.
Kind regards, Yuko Fukuma Senior Staff Officer of Kawasaki Heavy Industries
Saturday Paper 30th November 2019
Mike Seccombe
....IF AUSTRALIA GOES WITH HYDROGEN PRODUCED BY FOSSIL FUELS, THEN IT “SHOOTS ITSELF IN THE FOOT”, MEINSHAUSEN SAYS, FOR THE WORLD WILL SIMPLY CHOOSE TO BUY GREEN HYDROGEN IF IT CAN.
Although touted as a clean energy project, the government’s investment in hydrogen production is in fact protecting the fossil fuel industry – a paradox that may limit the value of the new technology. By Mike Seccombe.
Hydrogen strategy backs dirty coal
At first blush, last Saturday’s media release from two of the Morrison government’s biggest defenders of fossil fuels looked like evidence of some kind of Damascene conversion.
Angus Taylor and Matt Canavan were suddenly enthused about the prospects of clean energy. They were talking about hydrogen, a wonderful fuel source that, when burned, produces no greenhouse emissions at all. And they were talking big.
“Australia will become a world leader in hydrogen production and exports thanks to a new fund set up by the Government,” began the release.
It went on to quote the Energy minister, Taylor, predicting Australia would become “a hydrogen supplier to the world”.
And Resources Minister Canavan, who has long run a scare campaign that renewables would cost jobs and damage the economy, was quoted spruiking the “potential for thousands of new jobs … and billions of dollars in economic growth between now and 2050” through the export of hydrogen to countries such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan.
The ministers also announced $370 million in funding towards the implementation of a national hydrogen strategy, prepared by Australia’s chief scientist, Dr Alan Finkel, and approved by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) Energy Council the day before.
It looked like a major shift in the government’s position on climate change, and no doubt this was its purpose – for the government’s recalcitrance in addressing the great issue of our time is the subject of increasing criticism, both internationally and domestically.....
More importantly, though, there is evidence to suggest the government’s intent in getting into the hydrogen economy is, as ever, to protect the fossil fuel industry by locking it in as the preferred source for Australia’s hydrogen production.
IF AUSTRALIA GOES WITH HYDROGEN PRODUCED BY FOSSIL FUELS, THEN IT “SHOOTS ITSELF IN THE FOOT”, MEINSHAUSEN SAYS, FOR THE WORLD WILL SIMPLY CHOOSE TO BUY GREEN HYDROGEN IF IT CAN.
Though hydrogen is colourless, people close to the issue are apt to talk about it in vivid terms. There is “green” hydrogen, which is produced by a process of electrolysis, splitting water molecules into their component elements: oxygen and hydrogen. This is an energy-intensive process, but if that energy comes from renewable sources, such as solar or wind power, the result is a completely clean source of storable, transportable energy.
There is also “blue” hydrogen, made from gas, and “brown”, made from coal. Both these processes produce large amounts of carbon dioxide, the principal cause of global heating. Hydrogen produced this way can be rendered cleaner, although still not totally clean, by capturing much of the CO2 and sequestering it somewhere so it does not enter the atmosphere – a process called carbon capture and storage (CCS).
Unsurprisingly, the fossil fuel industry has put vast effort over the years into talking up the prospects of CCS technology – not only in relation to hydrogen production but also more generally – because the prospect of CCS allows the fossil fuel industry to perpetuate the myth of clean coal.......
But that’s in the future. Right now, en route to its grand goal of becoming a “renewable energy superpower”, Australia is at a fork in the road.
One way leads to producing hydrogen from water; the other continues down the path of dependence on fossil fuels, albeit substantially cleaned up by the addition of expensive CCS technology.
Enormous amounts of money could hinge on making the right choice. According to Finkel, a “cautiously optimistic scenario” could see an Australian hydrogen industry generate about 7600 jobs and add about $11 billion a year in additional gross domestic product by 2050.
As his national hydrogen strategy states, “If global markets develop faster, it could mean another ten thousand jobs and at least $26 billion a year in GDP.”
Perhaps the strongest indicator that the federal government, as well as some states, will choose the fossil fuel route came out of last Friday’s COAG Energy Council meeting.
Shane Rattenbury, the ACT minister for Climate Change and Sustainability, went into the meeting with a proposal to amend the national hydrogen strategy so it supported only green hydrogen, produced from renewable electricity. The plan would mean hydrogen produced from fossil fuels would not be defined as “clean”.
He got zero support for the idea.
Rattenbury also proposed that hydrogen generated from fossil fuels using CCS be defined as “clean” only if a minimum of 90 per cent of carbon emissions were captured.
He lost on that idea, too. What was particularly frustrating, Rattenbury told The Saturday Paper, was that none of the other states and territories backed him.
“If you go to the strategy which Professor Finkel wrote, there’s a chapter [with] a little sort of two-page blurb on each jurisdiction,” he said. “And most of the jurisdictions, except New South Wales and Victoria, talk about how they want to do renewable hydrogen production. So that’s Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, Northern Territory, Tasmania.”
Rattenbury said the man running the meeting, Angus Taylor, rebuked him for even trying.
“The federal minister said to me, ‘Ministers cannot amend the draft strategy.’ He actually said that in front of the entire meeting,” Rattenbury said. “I mean, if ministers can’t amend this, I don’t know what we’re doing with our jobs. Why have the meeting?
“It was the most galling thing. Quite extraordinary.”
Rattenbury means no criticism of Finkel, who produced the strategy.
“He was given riding instructions at the previous meeting, last December, that the strategy should be technology-neutral,” Rattenbury said. “At that meeting, I also sought to insert that it should only be green hydrogen, and got nowhere.
“I don’t know what Professor Finkel’s personal view is. His stated position – and this is a positive thing that’s in the strategy – is a clear commitment to having a certification and labelling scheme, identifying the hydrogen’s emissions intensity and its source. Alan will argue, as will others, that the market will take care of it, and there will be a preference for renewable hydrogen or green hydrogen.”
Yet Australia is devoting far more money to pursuing the coal-to-hydrogen option. Of the $370 million funding announced by Taylor and Canavan, only $70 million is earmarked for work towards generating hydrogen from water.
Compare this with the amount being spent right now on a single project called the Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain (HESC). A consortium of Japanese and Australian interests is spending almost $500 million, including $50 million of federal government money and another $50 million from the Victorian government, on building a pilot coal-to-hydrogen plant, due to operate for one year over 2020 and 2021.
Last year, in answer to written questions from Dr Nick Aberle, campaigns manager for Environment Victoria, the HESC said the pilot would produce at most three tonnes of hydrogen during its one year of operation. To achieve that it would use 160 tonnes of brown coal – the most polluting of all fossil fuels – and would emit 100 tonnes of carbon dioxide.
The pilot plant would not attempt to capture and store that CO2, but was “considering purchasing carbon offsets to mitigate emissions from the pilot”.
Only if the project went on to commercial-scale production, at some unspecified date around 2030, would it seek to sequester the carbon dioxide. It would be pumped into the rocks under Bass Strait, as part of the CarbonNet Project, on which the federal and Victorian governments have invested some $150 million – so far.
It’s a lot of money to spend to produce a few tonnes of hydrogen and extend the life of Victoria’s dirty brown coal industry. But the greater concern for Aberle and others is that the HESC is the not-so-thin end of a wedge – that having spent half a billion dollars on the HESC pilot, and billions more on CCS projects, we will be locked in to the hydrogen-from-coal approach.
Meanwhile, Richie Merzian, the climate and energy program director at The Australia Institute, notes researchers at the Queensland University of Technology exported Australia’s first green hydrogen, made from water, using solar energy, to Japan in March.
Their work, using proprietary Japanese technology, is separate from but aligned with a $7.5 million research project to build a hydrogen production pilot plant at the Redlands Research Facility, south of Brisbane. The project was announced by ARENA last year.
Merzian said the green hydrogen exported to Japan “wasn’t much – just a few kilograms – but it was able to show proof of concept”.
“With the right support and commitment,” he continued, “Australia could build a cost-competitive renewable hydrogen industry in five to 10 years that will serve the country for decades to come. The same can’t be said for any high-emissions fossil-fuel-based hydrogen industry.
“There is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Australia to build a zero-emissions energy export and it could be squandered by the fossil fuel industry and its backers locking the country into high-emissions hydrogen using fossil fuels.”
The joke used to be that hydrogen was the fuel of the future and always would be. But there is no doubt it is a technology whose time is at last coming. Across the world, governments have set ambitious targets for its use. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, for example, declared at this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos a goal of making hydrogen cheaper than natural gas by 2050. China has asserted its determination to be the world leader in the technology.
But all refer to time frames of a decade or more.
“And so,” says Nick Aberle, “you’ve got to ask yourself the question: what’s the point of rushing to invest in coal-to-hydrogen right now?”
He suggests an answer: that the motivation is less to respond to climate change than to protect the coal industry and the jobs it provides.
Canavan’s comments to the media back in July, while speaking about the HESC project, add weight to the suggestion.
“It’s great to see a new life being given to those brown coal resources to create jobs in Australia, too,” he said.
And for now, at least, the government can offer the rationale of cost. Producing hydrogen from water is still a developing technology and is expensive.
However, says Frank Jotzo, director of the Centre for Climate and Energy Policy and co-director of the Energy Transition Hub at the Australian National University, that will change.
“The cost gap is going to narrow,” he told The Saturday Paper. “Renewable energy is becoming cheaper; we know that. And the costs of the electrolysers will come down as there is more investment in using electrolysis to generate green hydrogen, due to economies of scale and technological advances.”
Jotzo notes the International Energy Agency, as well as calculations made by his own centre, suggests that hydrogen from water is likely to become cost-competitive within a decade.
Even he, an expert in the field, is a bit startled by the rapid growth of ambition for a renewable future, including hydrogen. Only a few months ago he attended a conference in Brisbane, organised by climate activist and former US vice-president Al Gore, at which the Australian tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes suggested Australia should aim to generate 200 per cent of its domestic power needs from renewables, and export the excess. Now credible people are talking about even bigger numbers – 500 per cent, 700 per cent.
“People have finally understood broadly that if this goes well there is really no practical size limit to our renewable-based export industry,” says Jotzo. “That’s why you’re getting 500, 700 per cent. Some people now are talking 2000 per cent.”
It may sound preposterous, but, says Jotzo, “if you had all of the bauxite, all of the iron ore that’s mined in Australia actually processed in Australia using cheap Australian renewables, then you’d be beyond 2000 per cent”.
And that is on top of the potential to export billions of dollars’ worth of clean energy, in the form of hydrogen, to parts of the world that do not have Australia’s vast space and renewable resources of wind and solar energy.
Another of the country’s leading experts on the subject, Associate Professor Malte Meinshausen, of the Climate and Energy College at the University of Melbourne, worries that Australia is backing the wrong horse by funding coal-to-hydrogen projects.
“Technically,” he says, “you can do it either way.”
But if Australia goes with hydrogen produced by fossil fuels, then it “shoots itself in the foot”, Meinshausen says, for the world will simply choose to buy green hydrogen if it can.
“If you really want to be a renewable energy superpower,” he says, “if you want to do it at scale, then electrolysis is the way to go.
“Electrolysis already is being done on a large scale in Germany. And Germany is looking to import large amounts of hydrogen in the future.”
The European Union as a whole is moving towards hydrogen. But in order to fulfil future demand, Meinshausen says, it is “vital” that it be green. As concern about the climate crisis grows, the same will be true of potential markets everywhere. There simply will be no social licence for something produced through fossil fuels and their pollution.
“If Australia gets known for producing brown hydrogen from brown coal, it won’t work,” Meinshausen says.......
It was particularly critical of Australia, noting that, between now and 2030, “Australia’s coal production is projected to increase by 34 per cent [and its] government also envisions gas production growing by 20 per cent by 2024 and 33 per cent by 2030 relative to 2018 levels”.
Overall, Australia’s “extraction-based emissions from fossil fuel production” would go up 95 per cent by 2030 compared with 2005 levels.
So much for Morrison’s assurance that Australia is “doing our bit”.
In reality, we are among the leading contributors to history’s greatest tragedy of the commons, by our insistence on protecting our fossil fuel industry. Instead, not only could we take a leading role in combating climate change, but we could also enrich ourselves vastly by doing so.
This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on Nov 30, 2019 as "Played for a fuel". Subscribe here.
Mike Seccombe
....IF AUSTRALIA GOES WITH HYDROGEN PRODUCED BY FOSSIL FUELS, THEN IT “SHOOTS ITSELF IN THE FOOT”, MEINSHAUSEN SAYS, FOR THE WORLD WILL SIMPLY CHOOSE TO BUY GREEN HYDROGEN IF IT CAN.
Although touted as a clean energy project, the government’s investment in hydrogen production is in fact protecting the fossil fuel industry – a paradox that may limit the value of the new technology. By Mike Seccombe.
Hydrogen strategy backs dirty coal
At first blush, last Saturday’s media release from two of the Morrison government’s biggest defenders of fossil fuels looked like evidence of some kind of Damascene conversion.
Angus Taylor and Matt Canavan were suddenly enthused about the prospects of clean energy. They were talking about hydrogen, a wonderful fuel source that, when burned, produces no greenhouse emissions at all. And they were talking big.
“Australia will become a world leader in hydrogen production and exports thanks to a new fund set up by the Government,” began the release.
It went on to quote the Energy minister, Taylor, predicting Australia would become “a hydrogen supplier to the world”.
And Resources Minister Canavan, who has long run a scare campaign that renewables would cost jobs and damage the economy, was quoted spruiking the “potential for thousands of new jobs … and billions of dollars in economic growth between now and 2050” through the export of hydrogen to countries such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan.
The ministers also announced $370 million in funding towards the implementation of a national hydrogen strategy, prepared by Australia’s chief scientist, Dr Alan Finkel, and approved by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) Energy Council the day before.
It looked like a major shift in the government’s position on climate change, and no doubt this was its purpose – for the government’s recalcitrance in addressing the great issue of our time is the subject of increasing criticism, both internationally and domestically.....
More importantly, though, there is evidence to suggest the government’s intent in getting into the hydrogen economy is, as ever, to protect the fossil fuel industry by locking it in as the preferred source for Australia’s hydrogen production.
IF AUSTRALIA GOES WITH HYDROGEN PRODUCED BY FOSSIL FUELS, THEN IT “SHOOTS ITSELF IN THE FOOT”, MEINSHAUSEN SAYS, FOR THE WORLD WILL SIMPLY CHOOSE TO BUY GREEN HYDROGEN IF IT CAN.
Though hydrogen is colourless, people close to the issue are apt to talk about it in vivid terms. There is “green” hydrogen, which is produced by a process of electrolysis, splitting water molecules into their component elements: oxygen and hydrogen. This is an energy-intensive process, but if that energy comes from renewable sources, such as solar or wind power, the result is a completely clean source of storable, transportable energy.
There is also “blue” hydrogen, made from gas, and “brown”, made from coal. Both these processes produce large amounts of carbon dioxide, the principal cause of global heating. Hydrogen produced this way can be rendered cleaner, although still not totally clean, by capturing much of the CO2 and sequestering it somewhere so it does not enter the atmosphere – a process called carbon capture and storage (CCS).
Unsurprisingly, the fossil fuel industry has put vast effort over the years into talking up the prospects of CCS technology – not only in relation to hydrogen production but also more generally – because the prospect of CCS allows the fossil fuel industry to perpetuate the myth of clean coal.......
But that’s in the future. Right now, en route to its grand goal of becoming a “renewable energy superpower”, Australia is at a fork in the road.
One way leads to producing hydrogen from water; the other continues down the path of dependence on fossil fuels, albeit substantially cleaned up by the addition of expensive CCS technology.
Enormous amounts of money could hinge on making the right choice. According to Finkel, a “cautiously optimistic scenario” could see an Australian hydrogen industry generate about 7600 jobs and add about $11 billion a year in additional gross domestic product by 2050.
As his national hydrogen strategy states, “If global markets develop faster, it could mean another ten thousand jobs and at least $26 billion a year in GDP.”
Perhaps the strongest indicator that the federal government, as well as some states, will choose the fossil fuel route came out of last Friday’s COAG Energy Council meeting.
Shane Rattenbury, the ACT minister for Climate Change and Sustainability, went into the meeting with a proposal to amend the national hydrogen strategy so it supported only green hydrogen, produced from renewable electricity. The plan would mean hydrogen produced from fossil fuels would not be defined as “clean”.
He got zero support for the idea.
Rattenbury also proposed that hydrogen generated from fossil fuels using CCS be defined as “clean” only if a minimum of 90 per cent of carbon emissions were captured.
He lost on that idea, too. What was particularly frustrating, Rattenbury told The Saturday Paper, was that none of the other states and territories backed him.
“If you go to the strategy which Professor Finkel wrote, there’s a chapter [with] a little sort of two-page blurb on each jurisdiction,” he said. “And most of the jurisdictions, except New South Wales and Victoria, talk about how they want to do renewable hydrogen production. So that’s Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, Northern Territory, Tasmania.”
Rattenbury said the man running the meeting, Angus Taylor, rebuked him for even trying.
“The federal minister said to me, ‘Ministers cannot amend the draft strategy.’ He actually said that in front of the entire meeting,” Rattenbury said. “I mean, if ministers can’t amend this, I don’t know what we’re doing with our jobs. Why have the meeting?
“It was the most galling thing. Quite extraordinary.”
Rattenbury means no criticism of Finkel, who produced the strategy.
“He was given riding instructions at the previous meeting, last December, that the strategy should be technology-neutral,” Rattenbury said. “At that meeting, I also sought to insert that it should only be green hydrogen, and got nowhere.
“I don’t know what Professor Finkel’s personal view is. His stated position – and this is a positive thing that’s in the strategy – is a clear commitment to having a certification and labelling scheme, identifying the hydrogen’s emissions intensity and its source. Alan will argue, as will others, that the market will take care of it, and there will be a preference for renewable hydrogen or green hydrogen.”
Yet Australia is devoting far more money to pursuing the coal-to-hydrogen option. Of the $370 million funding announced by Taylor and Canavan, only $70 million is earmarked for work towards generating hydrogen from water.
Compare this with the amount being spent right now on a single project called the Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain (HESC). A consortium of Japanese and Australian interests is spending almost $500 million, including $50 million of federal government money and another $50 million from the Victorian government, on building a pilot coal-to-hydrogen plant, due to operate for one year over 2020 and 2021.
Last year, in answer to written questions from Dr Nick Aberle, campaigns manager for Environment Victoria, the HESC said the pilot would produce at most three tonnes of hydrogen during its one year of operation. To achieve that it would use 160 tonnes of brown coal – the most polluting of all fossil fuels – and would emit 100 tonnes of carbon dioxide.
The pilot plant would not attempt to capture and store that CO2, but was “considering purchasing carbon offsets to mitigate emissions from the pilot”.
Only if the project went on to commercial-scale production, at some unspecified date around 2030, would it seek to sequester the carbon dioxide. It would be pumped into the rocks under Bass Strait, as part of the CarbonNet Project, on which the federal and Victorian governments have invested some $150 million – so far.
It’s a lot of money to spend to produce a few tonnes of hydrogen and extend the life of Victoria’s dirty brown coal industry. But the greater concern for Aberle and others is that the HESC is the not-so-thin end of a wedge – that having spent half a billion dollars on the HESC pilot, and billions more on CCS projects, we will be locked in to the hydrogen-from-coal approach.
Meanwhile, Richie Merzian, the climate and energy program director at The Australia Institute, notes researchers at the Queensland University of Technology exported Australia’s first green hydrogen, made from water, using solar energy, to Japan in March.
Their work, using proprietary Japanese technology, is separate from but aligned with a $7.5 million research project to build a hydrogen production pilot plant at the Redlands Research Facility, south of Brisbane. The project was announced by ARENA last year.
Merzian said the green hydrogen exported to Japan “wasn’t much – just a few kilograms – but it was able to show proof of concept”.
“With the right support and commitment,” he continued, “Australia could build a cost-competitive renewable hydrogen industry in five to 10 years that will serve the country for decades to come. The same can’t be said for any high-emissions fossil-fuel-based hydrogen industry.
“There is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Australia to build a zero-emissions energy export and it could be squandered by the fossil fuel industry and its backers locking the country into high-emissions hydrogen using fossil fuels.”
The joke used to be that hydrogen was the fuel of the future and always would be. But there is no doubt it is a technology whose time is at last coming. Across the world, governments have set ambitious targets for its use. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, for example, declared at this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos a goal of making hydrogen cheaper than natural gas by 2050. China has asserted its determination to be the world leader in the technology.
But all refer to time frames of a decade or more.
“And so,” says Nick Aberle, “you’ve got to ask yourself the question: what’s the point of rushing to invest in coal-to-hydrogen right now?”
He suggests an answer: that the motivation is less to respond to climate change than to protect the coal industry and the jobs it provides.
Canavan’s comments to the media back in July, while speaking about the HESC project, add weight to the suggestion.
“It’s great to see a new life being given to those brown coal resources to create jobs in Australia, too,” he said.
And for now, at least, the government can offer the rationale of cost. Producing hydrogen from water is still a developing technology and is expensive.
However, says Frank Jotzo, director of the Centre for Climate and Energy Policy and co-director of the Energy Transition Hub at the Australian National University, that will change.
“The cost gap is going to narrow,” he told The Saturday Paper. “Renewable energy is becoming cheaper; we know that. And the costs of the electrolysers will come down as there is more investment in using electrolysis to generate green hydrogen, due to economies of scale and technological advances.”
Jotzo notes the International Energy Agency, as well as calculations made by his own centre, suggests that hydrogen from water is likely to become cost-competitive within a decade.
Even he, an expert in the field, is a bit startled by the rapid growth of ambition for a renewable future, including hydrogen. Only a few months ago he attended a conference in Brisbane, organised by climate activist and former US vice-president Al Gore, at which the Australian tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes suggested Australia should aim to generate 200 per cent of its domestic power needs from renewables, and export the excess. Now credible people are talking about even bigger numbers – 500 per cent, 700 per cent.
“People have finally understood broadly that if this goes well there is really no practical size limit to our renewable-based export industry,” says Jotzo. “That’s why you’re getting 500, 700 per cent. Some people now are talking 2000 per cent.”
It may sound preposterous, but, says Jotzo, “if you had all of the bauxite, all of the iron ore that’s mined in Australia actually processed in Australia using cheap Australian renewables, then you’d be beyond 2000 per cent”.
And that is on top of the potential to export billions of dollars’ worth of clean energy, in the form of hydrogen, to parts of the world that do not have Australia’s vast space and renewable resources of wind and solar energy.
Another of the country’s leading experts on the subject, Associate Professor Malte Meinshausen, of the Climate and Energy College at the University of Melbourne, worries that Australia is backing the wrong horse by funding coal-to-hydrogen projects.
“Technically,” he says, “you can do it either way.”
But if Australia goes with hydrogen produced by fossil fuels, then it “shoots itself in the foot”, Meinshausen says, for the world will simply choose to buy green hydrogen if it can.
“If you really want to be a renewable energy superpower,” he says, “if you want to do it at scale, then electrolysis is the way to go.
“Electrolysis already is being done on a large scale in Germany. And Germany is looking to import large amounts of hydrogen in the future.”
The European Union as a whole is moving towards hydrogen. But in order to fulfil future demand, Meinshausen says, it is “vital” that it be green. As concern about the climate crisis grows, the same will be true of potential markets everywhere. There simply will be no social licence for something produced through fossil fuels and their pollution.
“If Australia gets known for producing brown hydrogen from brown coal, it won’t work,” Meinshausen says.......
It was particularly critical of Australia, noting that, between now and 2030, “Australia’s coal production is projected to increase by 34 per cent [and its] government also envisions gas production growing by 20 per cent by 2024 and 33 per cent by 2030 relative to 2018 levels”.
Overall, Australia’s “extraction-based emissions from fossil fuel production” would go up 95 per cent by 2030 compared with 2005 levels.
So much for Morrison’s assurance that Australia is “doing our bit”.
In reality, we are among the leading contributors to history’s greatest tragedy of the commons, by our insistence on protecting our fossil fuel industry. Instead, not only could we take a leading role in combating climate change, but we could also enrich ourselves vastly by doing so.
This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on Nov 30, 2019 as "Played for a fuel". Subscribe here.
| joint_8_hastings_marine_pest_hydrogen__monitoring_letter.doc |
Joint 8 Group Marine Pest Monitoring Letter
Yuko Fukuma
Senior Staff Officer
Kawasaki Heavy Industries
Care of GHD
Level 7 180 Lonsdale Street
Melbourne 3000
The Prime Minister
Hon Scott Morrison
Parliament House
Canberra
ACT 2600
Hon Jaala Pulford MP
Minister for Agriculture
15 Main Street Ballarat
Vic 3350
Hon Daniel Andrews
Office of the Premier
1 Treasury place Melbourne
Australia VIC 3002
Dear Sirs and Madam,
RE: Request for Marine Pest Monitoring at Bluescope as part of The Hydrogen Export Trial
We believe the Japanese ships that would arrive in Hastings, as part of the Hydrogen Export Trial, pose a marine pest threat to Westernport Bay. We are writing to request Marine Pest Monitoring at Bluescope as part of the Kawasaki, J Power and Iwatani trial exporting hydrogen gas from Hastings. We would also urge close vigilance from EPA in following ballast water treatment procedures. If there are marine pests found there must be a program to attempt to clear them up.
Westernport Bay currently does not have Northern Pacific Seastar and Undaria pinnatifide, (Japanese kelp). These organisms have devastated the ecology of Port Phillip Bay, Apollo Bay and The Derwent Estuary. The trial threatens to bring in these pests, as gas ships are to come straight from Japan, their native home. Currently there is no underwater monitoring being done at Bluescope Hastings, and there hasn’t been for more than a year. We demand the site is monitored for at least four years for marine pests after the last ship.
We, the groups represented, strongly oppose the project proceeding to commercial stages and trust that it will never proceed because the necessary dredging in Hastings is unconscionable. (Ref: Infrastructure Victoria Container Port Discussion Paper). We question the sense of doing a trial for such a flawed project.
The Federal and State Governments have contributed 50 Million dollars each for this trial and Japan, 400 million. Some money for the trial must be put towards protecting our Ramsar listed environment.
Yours sincerely,
Karri Giles
Secretary Westernport and Peninsula Protection Council Inc On behalf of the groups above and below
RenewEconomy's Giles Parkinson summed up the new venture perfectly:
Yes, that’s right: $500 million to build a pilot plant that will operate for just 12 months and produce a grand total “up to” three tonnes of hydrogen over the whole year. I had to read that ten times and get on the phone twice to check. World-first, perhaps, because it is hard to imagine another country that would think of turning brown coal into hydrogen and at such an outrageous cost — least of all one with such rich wind and solar resources, and which already has some cheaper renewables-fuelled hydrogen projects of its own.
Yes, that’s right: $500 million to build a pilot plant that will operate for just 12 months and produce a grand total “up to” three tonnes of hydrogen over the whole year. I had to read that ten times and get on the phone twice to check. World-first, perhaps, because it is hard to imagine another country that would think of turning brown coal into hydrogen and at such an outrageous cost — least of all one with such rich wind and solar resources, and which already has some cheaper renewables-fuelled hydrogen projects of its own.
No Hydrogen Exports for Westernport Save Our Fish Stocks
13/4/18
Press Release from WPPC Say No to Kawasaki at Hastings“The Federal and State Government’s announcement that hydrogen would be shipped from the Port of Hastings to Japan is unwelcome to Westernport and Peninsula Protection Council.”
Representative of our group WPPC met last year with a Public Relations woman from GHD representing three Japanese companies: Kawasaki, J Power and Iwatani. She explained that Japan is trying to move to a hydrogen economy. They have proposed to export hydrogen gas from Hastings made from Loy Yang’s brown coal. Loy Lang has recently been sold to a Chinese company. The proposal involves: Partially burning brown coal at Loy Yang, pumping the CO2 produced underground (once a location and method of sequestrating has been determined), trucking of gas to Hastings, converting it to liquid at Hastings in a new plant, building a new port to export it, shipping it to Japan and converting it back to gas in Japan.
“Four industrial processes, two journeys and the wrecking of Westernport Bay by dredging and marine pests makes this hydrogen power source for Japan definitely not green or clean.”
It must be one of the least efficient power sources ever dreamt up, and certainly one of the most expensive. They told us they “are looking for a partnership with the Victorian Government” and sure enough this week our governments have announced a spend of 100 million on the trial alone.
We have 3 main problems with this proposal
2. Marine Pests would kill fish stocks.The fact the ships are empty and require ballast means marine pests i.e. The Japanese Northern Pacific Star Fish. This starfish came into Derwent estuary woodchip port either in the Ballast water or on the hull of Japanese ship in the 1980s. It then was found in Port Phillip Bay in the 1990s. Westernport Bay currently does not have Northern Pacific Sea Star and we do not want to see empty ships from Japan full of Ballast water enter Westernport Bay. While Ballast water is exchanged at sea, if one star fish remains in the ship or on the hull it can produce thousands of larvae.
3. This project has Questionable viability. The amount of emissions involved with four industrial processes, a stream of trucks on our roads with highly explosive gas, long ship journeys and the wrecking of Westernport Bay makes this a very dirty form of energy and a very expensive one. This project is probably unviable. We have seen many projects fail in Westernport because they are unviable in the 47 years of WPPC’s history. It never seems to stop our governments from announcing them or subsidizing them.We join with Environment Victoria as being very worried about another failed project for Latrobe Valley. They deserve a sustainable job creation boost, not one that is likely to be unviable. Australia has migratory bird agreements with Japan and China. Westernport Bay hosts 35 species of migratory wader birds.We started a letter writing campaign on this issue last year and the letter is available on our website. We have had no consultation from the Government but a letter back from the State Trade minister. We have asked to meet the Trade Minister in Early March with no response. We told the GHD rep Libby that members of our group, and other groups concerned about this, are experienced and prepared to lobbying at high levels and blockade.Karri Giles
SecretaryWesternport and Peninsula Protection Council [email protected] 0425 707 448
Press Release from WPPC Say No to Kawasaki at Hastings“The Federal and State Government’s announcement that hydrogen would be shipped from the Port of Hastings to Japan is unwelcome to Westernport and Peninsula Protection Council.”
Representative of our group WPPC met last year with a Public Relations woman from GHD representing three Japanese companies: Kawasaki, J Power and Iwatani. She explained that Japan is trying to move to a hydrogen economy. They have proposed to export hydrogen gas from Hastings made from Loy Yang’s brown coal. Loy Lang has recently been sold to a Chinese company. The proposal involves: Partially burning brown coal at Loy Yang, pumping the CO2 produced underground (once a location and method of sequestrating has been determined), trucking of gas to Hastings, converting it to liquid at Hastings in a new plant, building a new port to export it, shipping it to Japan and converting it back to gas in Japan.
“Four industrial processes, two journeys and the wrecking of Westernport Bay by dredging and marine pests makes this hydrogen power source for Japan definitely not green or clean.”
It must be one of the least efficient power sources ever dreamt up, and certainly one of the most expensive. They told us they “are looking for a partnership with the Victorian Government” and sure enough this week our governments have announced a spend of 100 million on the trial alone.
We have 3 main problems with this proposal
- Dredging would kill fish stocks.
Why would our State Government reject a container port on the basis of the infrastructure Victoria report, and then entertain this proposal? The dredging involved with bringing very large ships into Hastings would be massive. Infrastructure Victoria said it would take 23 million cubic metres inside Westernport (the same amount as the infamous channel deepening in the much larger Port Phillip Bay, Victoria’s biggest infrastructure project yet) and the same 23 cubic metres outside Westernport, to bring in material that is heavy for reclaimation because the existing bottom of Westernport, which is more of an estuary than a Bay, is unsuitably silty.
2. Marine Pests would kill fish stocks.The fact the ships are empty and require ballast means marine pests i.e. The Japanese Northern Pacific Star Fish. This starfish came into Derwent estuary woodchip port either in the Ballast water or on the hull of Japanese ship in the 1980s. It then was found in Port Phillip Bay in the 1990s. Westernport Bay currently does not have Northern Pacific Sea Star and we do not want to see empty ships from Japan full of Ballast water enter Westernport Bay. While Ballast water is exchanged at sea, if one star fish remains in the ship or on the hull it can produce thousands of larvae.
3. This project has Questionable viability. The amount of emissions involved with four industrial processes, a stream of trucks on our roads with highly explosive gas, long ship journeys and the wrecking of Westernport Bay makes this a very dirty form of energy and a very expensive one. This project is probably unviable. We have seen many projects fail in Westernport because they are unviable in the 47 years of WPPC’s history. It never seems to stop our governments from announcing them or subsidizing them.We join with Environment Victoria as being very worried about another failed project for Latrobe Valley. They deserve a sustainable job creation boost, not one that is likely to be unviable. Australia has migratory bird agreements with Japan and China. Westernport Bay hosts 35 species of migratory wader birds.We started a letter writing campaign on this issue last year and the letter is available on our website. We have had no consultation from the Government but a letter back from the State Trade minister. We have asked to meet the Trade Minister in Early March with no response. We told the GHD rep Libby that members of our group, and other groups concerned about this, are experienced and prepared to lobbying at high levels and blockade.Karri Giles
SecretaryWesternport and Peninsula Protection Council [email protected] 0425 707 448
1/3/2018
Dear Hon Phillip Dalidakis MP,
Thank you for your letter to our Treasurer Sheila Ker Ref: CMIN180568R
Re Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain Project,
We are disbelieving and incredulous that you are working with the consortia led by Kawasaki Heavy Industries (KHI) to further the Hydrogen Energy Supply Chain Project. The use of hydrogen in Japan after three industrial processes and shipping out of a new port in Westernport Bay, to Japan does not in any way constitute a low-emission or a green energy source.
Infrastructure Victoria found that building a port in Hastings would entail approximately 55million cubic metres of dredging, about twice as much as the infamous Channel Deepening Project. This is unconscionable.
Hydrogen trucks on our roads, government subsidises, and empty ships requiring Ballast from the Northern Pacific Seastar’s natural home of Japan, are all reason enough to abandon this plan.
Because of the use of fossil fuels, Japan Australia Migratory Bird Agreement, and Ramsar status of Westernport Bay we look forward to building alliances to oppose this issue with local, State, National, and International Groups. This could also play as a great script in a Working Dog production such as Utopia.
We request a meeting with you to discuss this matter.
Karri Giles
Secretary - WPPC
[email protected]
| wppc_hydrogen_hastings_press_release.doc |
Major Container Port Proposal -
NO PORT FOR WESTERNPORT BAY
The State Government has published plans to concrete four kilometres of the coast from Hastings through Tyabb, to Yaringa.The Proposed Port of Hastings involves dredging and the removal of mangroves.The associated development of road, rail and container storage makes this plan the biggest infrastructure plan ever for Victoria. This needs to have The Federal Government's approval because Westernport Bay is a Ramsar Site and on The Natural Heritage Estate Register. Increases in shipping would expose Westernport Bay to threats such as oil spill and marine pests. We are opposed to this plan. For more information see Port of Hastings.
WPPC respond to the Draft Port of Hastings Transport Strategy
· The environmental risks of port operation and port development in Westernport are unacceptable have not been addressed in this Consultation Draft, but remain as potential showstoppers.
· Expensive and time consuming studies such as this one have now been carried out several times over a number of years, and they all continue to ignore the warnings of the science ‘on the table’. The science is well known and the dangers it foretells well understood.
· Westernport is shallow, narrow and highly tidal, approximately 40% of its area being inter-tidal mudflats which form the basis of a highly productive and diverse ecosystem. Twice a day the bottom of 40% of the Bay is in contact with the surface making any pollutant on the surface, such as oil, coat the benthic organisms (the plants and animals on the bottom) directly.
· As well as the well known colonies of penguins and Australian fur seals, the bay is host to thousands of marine species, a breeding ground for ocean fish, and the summer feeding ground for about 35 species of migrant wader birds from Siberia, China, Japan and Alaska. Almost the entire area of the bay is listed as a Ramsar wetland, and it is the largest Ramsar site in Victoria. Many of the bird species listed in the JAMBA and CAMBA agreements use the bay. The ecological significance and the sensitivity of Westernport were brought to public attention in the 1970's by a major environmental study [1], and an up to date summary of that study and of subsequent work is contained in the Westernport Bay Strategy 1992[2].
· Dredging If a process of development were to start, deepening the already ‘deep’ channels would be on the agenda. The old chestnut of ‘the natural advantage of natural deep water’ is rubbish. In the Port of Hastings Strategic Land Use and Transport Access Corridor Planning Study- Community Reference Group- Options Briefing Dept of Infrastructure, Port of Hastings and Maunsell. Oct 2005 Deepening of the Channel is mentioned….."Likely Vessel Requirements….Existing Channel depth 14.3metres at lowest tide (zero tide). Tidal assistance will be required at times to allow large vessels access to the port of Hastings- a scheduling constraint. Deepening of Channel [from 14.3m] to 16m would provide greater flexibility’.
· Significant dredging has been proposed just to establish the wharf. Drawings from pg. 10 to 14 show areas of 1.5kms to more than 4kms long, and 600m to 750m wide hatched to depict potential dredging areas. In addition to this there is an 800m basin hatched into seagrass flats for Dry Bulk. Dredging has several ways of affecting the environment. The immediate environment will suffer long-term affects, but probably even worse is the widespread threat to seagrass resulting from suspended sediments.
· Suspended sediments threaten seagrass and other life forms by seriously reducing sunlight, adding nutrients that stimulate algae growth, and reduce oxygen levels threatening eutrophication. [3]
· Seagrass habitat is crucial in driving fisheries production, contributing to %90 of the total nutrition of key fisheries target species.[4]
· The roots of Seagrass and mangroves stabilise the sediments and provide oxygen, and where they have died back at the north of The Bay crabs and shell-fish dig air holes- providing oxygen to the muddy bottom of Westernport Bay. These crabs and shell-fish live off plant matter brought to them on the tides, and plankton.
· The health of the benthos (bottom of The Bay) is crucial for absorbing the nutrients entering the water coloum from Shipping, stormwater or suspended sediments. Nutrients that are in excess create potentially toxic algae blooms and lower oxygen levels threatening eutophication. 3
· Tidal movements mean oil spills, marine pest larvae, and dredge spoil would not stay confined to the proposed port area. Western Port is a massive tidal wetland, about 40 per cent of, which is dry twice a day. Through the middle of the seagrass-covered mudflats runs the shipping channel, which surges with the tidal flows bringing the waters of the port into contact with the sensitive ecosystem. The water moves on each tide a distance of 10 to 20 kilometres and, over weeks, circulates around French Island - a giant washing machine. Based on observations of water movements, in The Shapiro Study, Professor Jon Hinwoodand his colleagues designed a mathematical model that predicted how a polluting material. For example, the cloud of fine particles of silt produced by dredging - would spread around the whole bay within a few weeks. The inevitable polluting effects of port development and port operation - oil spills, introduced marine pest larvae, as well as the ever-necessary dredging - are not therefore confined to the port area: a pollution event anywhere in the bay would in a short time affect the whole bay.
· Marine Pests An increase in shipping means an increase in the threat of marine pests. Westernport Bay had 7 species of marine pest in 1997, none of them major marine pests. Corio Bay in Port Phillip and Derwent River Hobart are two bays that have Dry Bulk facilities used buy Woodchip Ships from Japan where the Northern Pacific Seastars originate. Northern Pacific Sea stars in Port Phillip Bay have been identified as a contributor to the dramatic loss of commercial fish stocks in Port Phillip Bay. In the last ten years or so fish stocks in the middle of the Bay, where these creatures dominate, have fallen by 20%. (conservatively) [5] No sane person would propose a dry bulk facility for Westernport Bay.
· Oil Spills
Mr. P McGrath, Chief Executive of AMSA, stated at Spillcon 94:"other than in exceptional circumstances, current technology does not exist to prevent weather driven oil from an inshore incident coming ashore on the coastline." Westernport consists of narrow, tidal waterways around two islands, so that a ship must always be within 2 to 5 km of a coastline. Much of the time there is "weather", so current technology doesnot exist to save Westernport from a moderate or major spill. A moderate (say 550 tonnes!) or major (10,000 tonnes) spill would be catastrophic, and once deposited more damage would be caused by attempted removal.
"What is the risk of a major oil spill?" [6]. To quote ANAO: "As AMSA says, 'It is only a matter of time'. The remarks made in the second and third paragraphs of this section are all especially relevant to Westernport: …."Oil may be ingested by marine and animal life and the toxic chemicals in oil, and dispersants used to treat the oil, can have a significant ecological impact. This is a particular problem in mangroves, seagrass, and reef areas where it is difficult to remove the oil."….."Spilled oil can have a serious economic impact on coastal activities such as tourism and the fishing industry."
Also relevant to Westernport Bay in the ANAO report is the observation[7] that:…."The National Plan Review identified that swift currents and high tidal velocities severely limit the opportunity for physical response (use of booms and skimmers) throughout Torres Strait and Northern Territory waters." These conditions also apply in Westernport, where tides run at up to 5 knots along the narrow arms of the bay. These conditions render the use of booms largely ineffective. The alternative response tool pointed to in the audit for Torres Strait and Northern Territory, namelydispersant,should also be regarded as generally unacceptable in Westernport, due to it's toxicity. Thus the two principal oil-spill response tools will be generally unavailable in Westernport.
· We demand an Environmental Impact Assessment on the Whole Completed Project.
Since the proclamation of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 the Ramsar Convention has become a part of Australian federal law, and any action that has or will have or is likely to have a significant impact on the ecological character of a declared Ramsar wetland must be referred to the Federal Minister for the Environment. It is unacceptable, therefore, to refer to an ‘EES’ which is a State process. No justification is given in the document and the verbal explanation given at the CRG briefing meeting that ‘DEH have determined that the EES process will inform both EES and EIS processes’ in unacceptable
This report should state simply that because the site is a Ramsar site, reference of all proposed actions will be mandatory under the EPBC Act, leaving a determination by the Minister to follow based on the full facts of the proposed action.
We are concerned also with the term ‘strategic assessment’ as applying to an ‘EES’. We are not aware of this term being used in the EPBC Act, (nor in the Victorian Environment Effects Act) and it deserves definition.
We believe it is vital that a full and detailed environmental impact assessment be carried out on a completed 3-stage project before any start is made on stage 1
· Alternative Solutions: We believe further that alternative solutions (taking all modes of transport and the national interest into account) be assessed in such a full EIA; and that the full economic cost/benefit case for each alternative be assessed, using 21st century understanding of economics as including environmental costs. The ground breaking cost estimates of Costanza et al (forwarded as an attachment by Mr Len Warfe in his March 2006 submission) puts very high values on wetlands which were seen by the authors as probably very conservative. We do not pretend to prescribe a solution, but simply refer to Candy Broad's conclusion from the Victorian Ports Strategic Study consultations: "The consultations indicated a growing interest in intermodal operations and more integrated transport solutions." The proper next step should be a broad, open nationwide inquiry into the task of transporting goods involving all alternatives.
[1]Westernport Bay Environmental Study 1973-74, Director, Maurice Shapiro, Ministry for Conservation, Victoria, Melbourne, 1975.
[2]Westernport Bay Strategy, Westernport Regional Planning and Coordination Committee, Department of Planning and Development, Melbourne, 1992.
[3] Port Phillip Bay environmental Study. Final Report. CSIRO .1996
[4] Fish and seagrass- determining the links that drive fisheries production in Corner Inlet. Langmore .Andy Department of Primary Industries 30 September 2007
[5] Marine Pests affect on Fish stocks unpublished report from Greg Parry MAFRI Queenscliff.
[6]Audit Report No.9, : "Is Australia ready to respond to a major oil spill?", ANAO ,1994, p. xiii.
[7]ANAO op cit p xxii
· Expensive and time consuming studies such as this one have now been carried out several times over a number of years, and they all continue to ignore the warnings of the science ‘on the table’. The science is well known and the dangers it foretells well understood.
· Westernport is shallow, narrow and highly tidal, approximately 40% of its area being inter-tidal mudflats which form the basis of a highly productive and diverse ecosystem. Twice a day the bottom of 40% of the Bay is in contact with the surface making any pollutant on the surface, such as oil, coat the benthic organisms (the plants and animals on the bottom) directly.
· As well as the well known colonies of penguins and Australian fur seals, the bay is host to thousands of marine species, a breeding ground for ocean fish, and the summer feeding ground for about 35 species of migrant wader birds from Siberia, China, Japan and Alaska. Almost the entire area of the bay is listed as a Ramsar wetland, and it is the largest Ramsar site in Victoria. Many of the bird species listed in the JAMBA and CAMBA agreements use the bay. The ecological significance and the sensitivity of Westernport were brought to public attention in the 1970's by a major environmental study [1], and an up to date summary of that study and of subsequent work is contained in the Westernport Bay Strategy 1992[2].
· Dredging If a process of development were to start, deepening the already ‘deep’ channels would be on the agenda. The old chestnut of ‘the natural advantage of natural deep water’ is rubbish. In the Port of Hastings Strategic Land Use and Transport Access Corridor Planning Study- Community Reference Group- Options Briefing Dept of Infrastructure, Port of Hastings and Maunsell. Oct 2005 Deepening of the Channel is mentioned….."Likely Vessel Requirements….Existing Channel depth 14.3metres at lowest tide (zero tide). Tidal assistance will be required at times to allow large vessels access to the port of Hastings- a scheduling constraint. Deepening of Channel [from 14.3m] to 16m would provide greater flexibility’.
· Significant dredging has been proposed just to establish the wharf. Drawings from pg. 10 to 14 show areas of 1.5kms to more than 4kms long, and 600m to 750m wide hatched to depict potential dredging areas. In addition to this there is an 800m basin hatched into seagrass flats for Dry Bulk. Dredging has several ways of affecting the environment. The immediate environment will suffer long-term affects, but probably even worse is the widespread threat to seagrass resulting from suspended sediments.
· Suspended sediments threaten seagrass and other life forms by seriously reducing sunlight, adding nutrients that stimulate algae growth, and reduce oxygen levels threatening eutrophication. [3]
· Seagrass habitat is crucial in driving fisheries production, contributing to %90 of the total nutrition of key fisheries target species.[4]
· The roots of Seagrass and mangroves stabilise the sediments and provide oxygen, and where they have died back at the north of The Bay crabs and shell-fish dig air holes- providing oxygen to the muddy bottom of Westernport Bay. These crabs and shell-fish live off plant matter brought to them on the tides, and plankton.
· The health of the benthos (bottom of The Bay) is crucial for absorbing the nutrients entering the water coloum from Shipping, stormwater or suspended sediments. Nutrients that are in excess create potentially toxic algae blooms and lower oxygen levels threatening eutophication. 3
· Tidal movements mean oil spills, marine pest larvae, and dredge spoil would not stay confined to the proposed port area. Western Port is a massive tidal wetland, about 40 per cent of, which is dry twice a day. Through the middle of the seagrass-covered mudflats runs the shipping channel, which surges with the tidal flows bringing the waters of the port into contact with the sensitive ecosystem. The water moves on each tide a distance of 10 to 20 kilometres and, over weeks, circulates around French Island - a giant washing machine. Based on observations of water movements, in The Shapiro Study, Professor Jon Hinwoodand his colleagues designed a mathematical model that predicted how a polluting material. For example, the cloud of fine particles of silt produced by dredging - would spread around the whole bay within a few weeks. The inevitable polluting effects of port development and port operation - oil spills, introduced marine pest larvae, as well as the ever-necessary dredging - are not therefore confined to the port area: a pollution event anywhere in the bay would in a short time affect the whole bay.
· Marine Pests An increase in shipping means an increase in the threat of marine pests. Westernport Bay had 7 species of marine pest in 1997, none of them major marine pests. Corio Bay in Port Phillip and Derwent River Hobart are two bays that have Dry Bulk facilities used buy Woodchip Ships from Japan where the Northern Pacific Seastars originate. Northern Pacific Sea stars in Port Phillip Bay have been identified as a contributor to the dramatic loss of commercial fish stocks in Port Phillip Bay. In the last ten years or so fish stocks in the middle of the Bay, where these creatures dominate, have fallen by 20%. (conservatively) [5] No sane person would propose a dry bulk facility for Westernport Bay.
· Oil Spills
Mr. P McGrath, Chief Executive of AMSA, stated at Spillcon 94:"other than in exceptional circumstances, current technology does not exist to prevent weather driven oil from an inshore incident coming ashore on the coastline." Westernport consists of narrow, tidal waterways around two islands, so that a ship must always be within 2 to 5 km of a coastline. Much of the time there is "weather", so current technology doesnot exist to save Westernport from a moderate or major spill. A moderate (say 550 tonnes!) or major (10,000 tonnes) spill would be catastrophic, and once deposited more damage would be caused by attempted removal.
"What is the risk of a major oil spill?" [6]. To quote ANAO: "As AMSA says, 'It is only a matter of time'. The remarks made in the second and third paragraphs of this section are all especially relevant to Westernport: …."Oil may be ingested by marine and animal life and the toxic chemicals in oil, and dispersants used to treat the oil, can have a significant ecological impact. This is a particular problem in mangroves, seagrass, and reef areas where it is difficult to remove the oil."….."Spilled oil can have a serious economic impact on coastal activities such as tourism and the fishing industry."
Also relevant to Westernport Bay in the ANAO report is the observation[7] that:…."The National Plan Review identified that swift currents and high tidal velocities severely limit the opportunity for physical response (use of booms and skimmers) throughout Torres Strait and Northern Territory waters." These conditions also apply in Westernport, where tides run at up to 5 knots along the narrow arms of the bay. These conditions render the use of booms largely ineffective. The alternative response tool pointed to in the audit for Torres Strait and Northern Territory, namelydispersant,should also be regarded as generally unacceptable in Westernport, due to it's toxicity. Thus the two principal oil-spill response tools will be generally unavailable in Westernport.
· We demand an Environmental Impact Assessment on the Whole Completed Project.
Since the proclamation of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 the Ramsar Convention has become a part of Australian federal law, and any action that has or will have or is likely to have a significant impact on the ecological character of a declared Ramsar wetland must be referred to the Federal Minister for the Environment. It is unacceptable, therefore, to refer to an ‘EES’ which is a State process. No justification is given in the document and the verbal explanation given at the CRG briefing meeting that ‘DEH have determined that the EES process will inform both EES and EIS processes’ in unacceptable
This report should state simply that because the site is a Ramsar site, reference of all proposed actions will be mandatory under the EPBC Act, leaving a determination by the Minister to follow based on the full facts of the proposed action.
We are concerned also with the term ‘strategic assessment’ as applying to an ‘EES’. We are not aware of this term being used in the EPBC Act, (nor in the Victorian Environment Effects Act) and it deserves definition.
We believe it is vital that a full and detailed environmental impact assessment be carried out on a completed 3-stage project before any start is made on stage 1
· Alternative Solutions: We believe further that alternative solutions (taking all modes of transport and the national interest into account) be assessed in such a full EIA; and that the full economic cost/benefit case for each alternative be assessed, using 21st century understanding of economics as including environmental costs. The ground breaking cost estimates of Costanza et al (forwarded as an attachment by Mr Len Warfe in his March 2006 submission) puts very high values on wetlands which were seen by the authors as probably very conservative. We do not pretend to prescribe a solution, but simply refer to Candy Broad's conclusion from the Victorian Ports Strategic Study consultations: "The consultations indicated a growing interest in intermodal operations and more integrated transport solutions." The proper next step should be a broad, open nationwide inquiry into the task of transporting goods involving all alternatives.
[1]Westernport Bay Environmental Study 1973-74, Director, Maurice Shapiro, Ministry for Conservation, Victoria, Melbourne, 1975.
[2]Westernport Bay Strategy, Westernport Regional Planning and Coordination Committee, Department of Planning and Development, Melbourne, 1992.
[3] Port Phillip Bay environmental Study. Final Report. CSIRO .1996
[4] Fish and seagrass- determining the links that drive fisheries production in Corner Inlet. Langmore .Andy Department of Primary Industries 30 September 2007
[5] Marine Pests affect on Fish stocks unpublished report from Greg Parry MAFRI Queenscliff.
[6]Audit Report No.9, : "Is Australia ready to respond to a major oil spill?", ANAO ,1994, p. xiii.
[7]ANAO op cit p xxii