Mod 2 - Extension of Time

3.The drinking water catchment is unsuitable for CSG exploration and production. Allowing this development to go ahead contradicts the pre-election promise from Barry O'Farrell: "The next Liberal/National Government will ensure that mining cannot occur... in any water catchment area, and will ensure that mining leases and mining exploration permits reflect that common sense; no ifs, no buts, a guarantee."

The area that Apex Gas Exploration intends to drill exploratory boreholes is an extremely environmentally sensitive area. There is risk to our water catchement, there will be destruction to the environment due to land clearing and the boreholes will increase the bushfire risk due to leaking methane. area. The considerable community opposition has demonstrated that Apex has not been able to convince residents that the project is safe and/or desirable and it should not be allowed to continue.

I object in the strongest terms to any extension of the exploration licence. This proposal needs to remain frozen permanently. I cannot understand how any government could have so little regard for the health and welfare of its citizens to allow drilling and its associated contamination in a restricted designated water catchment area. There is ample documented evidence of the risks this activity poses and there is strong consistent evidence of community opposition to any extension of coal seam gas exploration and mining and the government needs to give these community concerns their attention and protect the water supply.

Please do not give these companys the right to destroy our land and water. These things are irreplaceable once damaged & they are things that humans can not survive without. What could possibly be more important than protecting the land that grows our food & the water we drink not to mention the beautiful environment that we all enjoy. Money, politics or any other reason can not be more important. If this is approved the person approving it should be publicly named so they can be shamed. I dont know how the people wanting & approving this project sleep at night. PLESAE DO NOT APPROVE THIS. WHAT DOES THE GOVERNMENT OWE THESE MINING COMPANYS. NOTHING IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN PROTECTING OUR LAND & WATER!!!

Sir/Madam, I would plead that this extension is not granted,
this government is responsible for our future water resources as well as future energy resources, by taking the time and waiting for the scientific community to secure a safe and reliable way to access CSG these resources can be protected, by issuing extensions such as this one it only protects the developer.
1.Development must always be considered in the context of the surrounding area. This can change over time. Given this, a modification for an indefinite start date is irresponsible.
2.The risks of CSG mining are well evidenced and the Premier has acknowledged that the current legislation is not adequate to manage development of the industry. In this context, no new applications or modifications should be approved and existing projects should be frozen, to conduct an investigation into the full impacts of CSG development.
3.The drinking water catchment is unsuitable for CSG exploration and production. Allowing this development to go ahead contradicts the pre-election promise from Barry O'Farrell: "The next Liberal/National Government will ensure that mining cannot occur... in any water catchment area, and will ensure that mining leases and mining exploration permits reflect that common sense; no ifs, no buts, a guarantee."
4.The Illawarra Escarpment is a high risk bush fire area, exacerbated by its highly combustible peat base. Indeed, in August 2012 a bush fire burnt through AI09 and AI10 in this project. Extracting and piping gas in this environment will increase fire risks.
5.The development of this coal seam gas project is being layered on top of extensive coal mining and a fault line, without an assessment of the combined impacts.
6.There is widespread public opposition to CSG exploration and mining in the area. This includes a public petition of over 30,000 signatures, formal votes against CSG mining by local councils and two actions opposing CSG development attended by over 3,000 people each.
sincerely yours, Roger S.A.Corben

Please do not approve this application. Some of the drilling will be in water catchment areas. Today in the newspaper, even the CSIRO couldn't say how polluted CSG drilling could be, but it could potentially pollute drinking water for hundreds of years.

Clean drinking water is ultimately far more precious than gas and the associated jobs.

Allowing this development to go ahead contradicts the pre-election promise from Barry O'Farrell in which he said "The next Liberal/National Government will ensure that mining cannot occur... in any water catchment area, and will ensure that mining leases and mining exploration permits reflect that common sense; no ifs, no buts, a guarantee."
It is unacceptable for this polluting industry to be allowed to develop in our water catchments.

It's lapsed - let it lapse some more.

We don't need no fracking.

We don't even need no non-fracking exploration of extraction at all.

Hey leave our water catchment alone!

I was in Texas recently.

What a mess this allowing licenses all over the place has proved.

The sun has set on this mob's licence to drill.

Make sure it never rises again.

Illawarra has just been given some contaminated soil from Barangaroo - how about you all go easy on us now and stop this CSG exploration anywhere within 200 kilometers of awater catchment area.

You've let BHP mine under our creeks in the past - and it hasn't gone real well.

This CSG stuff is just not a good look.

It's not even good at all.

So don't acquiesce to the potential contamination of our acquifers.

I am totally opposed to this proposal, as follows:
1. An indefinite start date for this project is totally irresponsible.
2. CSG mining is risky. There is plenty of evidence around proving this.
3. Our drinking water catchments MUST be protected from CSG and other mining activities.
4. The Illawarra Escarpment is a high bush fire risk area.
5. There needs to be a total moratorium on all CSG projects until the "science" has been completed. This "science" must be conducted by independent bodies.

I object to this application on the grounds that it allows for the continuation of an unpopular and potentially dangerous project. There is growing evidence that coal seam gas mining can have extremely negative impacts on the environment and human health. This project is especially concerning given the location of some of the wells in drinking-water catchment areas, potentially leading to the contamination of the drinking water of millions of people.

The risks are too great to allow this project to go ahead. There should be a full scientific investigation into coal seam gas mining, and no further projects should go ahead until it is scientifically proven to be safe.

There is also widespread public opposition to this project, as shown in several big community demonstrations against it in the Illawarra and a petition signed by more than 30,000 people. To grant approval on this application would be a complete affront to democracy and an insult to the community.

I object to this proposal as it is a health risk to my family and all other people in the Illawarra. My children and I are very concerned about the possibility of contamination of the water in this area. Do not grant this company an unrestricted licence to bore.

I and my children do not want this in our country! The Gov has no right to destroy our means of living ... Water!
the people do not want this.. CSG mining will kill us . Wake up to yourselves!

I oppose the Apex/Ormil submission.
Keep our water pure...do not frack or drill or mine our land!

I oppose the extension that Apex/Ormil is seeking.

I oppose granting the extension of activities to APEX Energy, and furthermore oppose any future CSG mining in the Illawarra, for the following reasons:

1. The area of the Illawarra upper escarpment is completely unsuited to CSG mining (both exploration and production) for a variety of dangerous reasons. The proposed mining areas consist almost entirely of SWA drinking water catchment "Special Areas" and dams, National Parks and other environmental preservation or conservation areas. It is also a high risk bush fire area which is exacerbated by its highly combustible peat base. The recent August 2012 bush fire ran through and burnt out APEX drill sites 9 and 10. If the wells had been in exploration or production phases, this would have been a catastrophic disaster. Even if you exclude the grave risks that CSG poses to our water catchment, it is obvious from this incident that the risk of fire renders this area entirely unsuitable for CSG mining (whether exploratory or production). CSG is usually methane, a highly explosive and flammable gas. This can leak from pipelines, wellheads, waste water and processing plants. It can even escape from underground systems due to CSG drilling disturbance. Researchers from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said air sampling of unconventional gas fields in Colorado showed leakage rates of 4% on average, and up to 7.7%.

Fire threatens water quality. The NSW Office of Water report said: "Bushfires can have devastating effects on catchment health, destroying native vegetation, farmland and infrastructure. Areas burnt by bushfires are prone to accelerated soil erosion, resulting in enhanced sediment and nutrient export to the surface water bodies downstream. Removal of vegetation by fire also reduces the ability of catchment areas to retain rainfall."

This area is an environmentally unique and highly sensitive upland swamp ecosystem, upon which the purity of our drinking water depends. Production CSG mining is an extensive and environmentally invasive industrial activity that will result in 150+ well pads and associated above ground infrastructure on the escarpment. This activity will undoubtedly permanently damage and or alter the ecology.

2. As a professional academic researcher currently undertaking a research fellowship at the Library of Congress in Washington DC, I have found an overwhelming volume of research that documents the grave risks of CSG mining (especially those relating to water contamination). Current NSW CSG control legislation is acknowledged by the premier himself as inadequate for managing this grave risk. The NSW Premier reconfirmed this in his recent interview with Alan Jones. The revised NSW Government regulatory framework has yet to be released and it would be unethical and improper to proceed prior to APEX being assessed against these requirements.

Aside from the risks CSG poses for both fire hazards and water contamination, the industry always uses massive quantities of water, and often depletes groundwater. Australia is a country that experiences frequent drought. Water is our most precious natural resource. We cannot afford to squander it on the CSG industry when we so desperately need it for drinking water and irrigation. Is Barry O'Farrell's government willing to throw away our clean drinking water and ability to produce and irrigate crops? The National Water Commission estimate that the Australian CSG industry will extract around 7,500 gigalitres (GL) of produced water from ground water systems over the next 25 years. To put this in perspective, that's more than 13 times the capacity of Sydney Harbour. They also note that the potential impacts of CSG development on water systems, particularly the cumulative effects of multiple projects, are not well understood.

4. The Illawarra is already under threat from massive coal mine expansion using long wall mining technologies. I understand that in the case of the Gujurat mine at Bulli the scale is 10x and at the Helensburgh Colliery 3x. The Warratah rivulet near Helensburgh that feeds the Woronora dam has already subsided and gone underground, as a result of Long Wall mining at the Metropolitan coal mine and 18 months of remedial work has failed to resolve the problem. Therefore the risks associated with CSG mining are being layered on top of the existing impact of extensive coal mining in the area - with no combined impact study yet undertaken!

4. The applicants (APEX Energy) have already shown their incompetence and unsuitability by allowing a PEL to lapse through default, as a result of an "administrative over-site" What if the result of the next "oversight" is contamination or fire in our catchment, or environmental conservation areas? APEX's `administrative oversight' offers this government a unique opportunity to cancel all CSG licences granted under the previous Labour government (which Barry O'Farrell himself acknowledged to be inappropriate) without financial compensation, since the error is on the part of APEX. In a December 1 interview, Premier O'Farrell told 2GB's Alan Jones:" I don't intend to allow -- particularly after the drought we went through over a decade -- mining or any other activity to threaten water resources." He also said: "[CSG] exploration licenses have been granted, in some cases permission to mine has been granted, in areas, frankly, that should never ever have been on the list."

5. There is widespread public opposition to CSG mining in the Illawarra and across the state. This includes a public petition of around 20,000 signatures delivered to the Premier, formal votes against CSG mining by 4 local councils (Wollongong, Wollondilly, Campbelltown and Sutherland), and at least 2 local state MP ( Lee Evans and Ryan Park). Major concerns exist around the original approvals forced through by the previous Labour government under part 3A of the NSW planning Act, which bypasses many of the usual and expected environmental and public consultation processes. I am very concerned by the absence of independent research into the environmental impact of CSG in such a vital area of water supply (let alone the combined impact of CSG and mining) and the lack of pubic consultation: Specifically APEX Energy did not enter into public consultation before its initial drilling at Darkes Forest, nor earlier this year before drilling within the Warragamba water catchment at Oakdale - this shows total a lack of respect for due process and public opinion.

6. Any decision to extend, renew, or other wise approve new activities in and around the water catchments flies in the face of commitments made by The Premier of NSW Barry O'Farrell: "The next Liberal/National Government will ensure that mining cannot occur ... in any water catchment area, and will ensure that mining leases and mining exploration permits reflect that common sense; no ifs, no buts, a guarantee."
The question remains, will Barry O'Farrell keep his promise? If he does not, the electorate will abandon him as swiftly as he abandons their right to clean drinking water.
Sincerely,

Dr Lindsay Tuggle
Kluge Research Fellow, Library of Congress,
Illawarra Resident and Australian Citizen:
6 Wigram Road, Austinmer NSW 2515

Please do not approve the modification. Please do not allow CSG drilling in the Illawara region.

The chemicals used in drilling are poison to humans (and nature) and will work their way into the ground water. I have a small brook in my backyard that will eventually be poisoned if this is allowed to proceed.

The risks of CSG mining are well evidenced and the Premier has acknowledged that the current legislation is not adequate to manage development of the industry. In this context, no new applications or modifications should be approved and existing projects should be frozen, to conduct an investigation into the full impacts of CSG development.

Any less is simply unacceptable to the community.

I am opposed to the extension of any approvals to drill for Coal Seam Gas in the proposed areas of Helensburgh, Darkes Forest and Maddens Plains. These areas are contained within the Woronora Catchment and are within a high fire prone area as witnessed during the 2001 Christmas Day bushfires. Maddens Plains is also one of few areas where the threatened Eastern Bristle bird can be found and is close to the edge of the Illawarra Escarpment where there has already been a number of rock falls and land slippage.

I do not support this submission, on the following grounds:
there is insufficient objective research on the long term effects of CSG extreaction on our aquifiers, which are important for our supply of drinking water and the quality of our arable land, both for farming and for supporting our wildlife.

there is insufficient safeguards in place regarding the safety of the CSG extraction methods.

continuing to deplete a natural resource is not a sustainable solution for our energy requirements

I am registering my OPPOSITION.