I oppose the proposed expansion of the Tarrawonga Coal Mine because of the following reasons:
1. The proposed "permanent" re-alignment of Goonbri Creek which is a 4th order stream in good to excellent condition, will turn a natural asset into a drain. The mine should halt 300m prior to Goonbri Creek and leave the creek in its current, natural and permanent location. Goonbri Creek is a major component of the groundwater recharge for the area of Barbers Lagoon and the township of Boggabri.
2. The clearing of 397 Ha of Native Vegetation including some
vegetation in the Leard State Forest. The consequence of this clearing is to increase the cumulative impact to the Leard Forest from the Boggabri Coal and Maules Creek Coal mines. This Forest is PUBLIC LAND and is being provided to a largely foreign owned company for private profit.
3. The project area will be rehabilitated by spreading a thin layer of topsoil over the overburden embankment. This is not sufficient to ensure the water holding capability can sustain White Box and other native trees which are currently found in the area.
4. The disturbance of surface water flows from the existing mine due to the overburden embankments has directed large volumes of mine water from within the project area onto the flood plain during the Nov 2011 and Feb 2012 floods. The increased project area in the Goonbri Creek Catchment due to the mine expansion will exasperate this issue.
5. The plan to leave a final void where there was native vegetation is not best practice. The void does not return the land to its pre-mining land capability and creates an evaporative pump that permanently negatively impacts on the ground water.
6. The water contained in the final void will increase in toxicity
and be a threat to native animals in the area and as shown in the recent flood event could be a major threat to the floodplain.

I object to the proposal to expand this coal mine beyond its previously approved extent on the following grounds:

1. The mine will destroy high quality woodlands that are currently functioning as ecological communities providing habitats for a wide range of species. Too much of NSW's woodlands have already been destroyed or significantly altered so the remaining areas should be conserved. Improving management of one area cannot "offset" the destruction of an area that is currently a high quality functioning woodland. While keeping common species and communities common is important, the fact that these woodlands include an endangered ecological community and habitats of threatened species makes this proposal more unacceptable.

2. The woodlands (including their soils) also have values as a carbon store and in the regional water cycle. Areas that have been cleared also have some of these values. Digging them up, storing the bits and puting it back after mining on top of the piles of crumbled rock will result in release of some of the stored carbon and gross alteration for ever to the way the water cycle functions. The thin layer of top soil will not enable recreation of the same types of ecological communities - not in a thousand years. Some of the same plant species may be able to grow there but not all. Some animals may die out as a result of cumulative impacts or climate change and never be able to return. New communities will develop and the new landscape will have some values but they won't be equivalent to the present values.

3. Leard State Forest is public land that was set aside to be kept as a publicly owned forest. It should not be destroyed for the private benefit of mining companies and their customers nor for very short term public financial gain from royalties. It should be managed sustainably for many hundreds of years not wrecked for 20 years of profit and royalties.

4. Similarly, the soil and ecological resources of the privately owned parts of the project site should be sustainably managed and handed on to future generations in better not poorer condition. I am sceptical about the claim that some land can be restored to class 3 agricultural value. Whether or not that is possible, there is no plan to restore class 4 areas to class 4 and leaving a final void is not leaving that land in equal or better condition.

5. The final void is unacceptable. When water evaporates from its surface that will enable water from higher groundwater layers to move into it, at least inperiods when evaporation exceeds rainfall. Being connected to coal seams it is likely to have water quality that is toxic to many species.

6. The whole mine and the adjoining mines will grossly alter the regional surface and groundwater systems, with adverse impacts on other water users. The fact that contaminated water had to be released from mines in this area in recent wet weather shows that the mining companies have not planned on avaoiding pollution in all types of weather events: worse extremes are likely to occur in the next few decades due to climate change and worse still in millenia to come. The mine therefore exposes pollutants that have been trapped for millenia and should be expected to cause future pollution as well as changing ground and surface flow patterns.

7. Goonbri Creek should not be moved. there should be no mining anywhere near it. There is too much risk that the engineers will make a mistake, e.g. not enough freeboard, or that future people will not understand the importance of leaving the proposed wall in tact, then the creek could be deverted into the void in some future big flood event (like or bigger than that which wiped out Grantham in Qld).

8. The expanded mine is to extract both steaming and coking coals. Australian and world economies should be moving rapidly to reduce their dependence on and use of steaming coal by using less energy and shifting to renewable sources in order to minimise risks of serious climate change. Our economies should also be reducing their dependence on extracting and using raw materials, particularly non-renewable ones like coking coal, to reduce both the impact of mining and carbon emissions (e.g. from mining/transport equipment burning oil and in steel making). We should be making better use of the steel, aluminium and other materials we have already produced. Yes, I do use non-renewable resources because I live in and try to help improve our society: a society which needs to reorganise itself partly by planning to significantly shift away from inefficient use of non-renewables. Planning in NSW should be aiming to achieve this, not to enable ongoing dependence on fossil fuels, wasting of non-renewable resources, and destruction of functioning ecosystems in the vane hope that a little effort will be sufficient to replace them. If no new coal projects were approved the markets would get a strong signal to shift economic resources into efficiency, recycling and renewable.

Thank you for considering these issues.

Dear Sir,
As a resident of Maules Creek i object to the merits of theTurrawonga Coal Project. The three main reasons being, cummulative dust effects from the Leard Forrest Coal Complex, the relocation of the Goonbri Road into a natural floodplain and the flow on effects that this will have when considering the closure of the Leard Forrest Road due to the Boggabri Coal Project - Taking away the only flood free access for the Maules Creek Community, and thirdly on environmental grounds - NSW does not need any new or expanded coal projects to provide for its own energy needs.
Thankyou ror the opportunity to comment.
Alistair Todd

2 Tarrawonga submissn

I further object to the proposed Tarrawonga Open-cut Coal Mine expansion near Boggabri for the following additional reasons:

New evidence of likely impacts on surface waters: The flooding of Boggabri CoalÃ,Â's existing operation pit and holding dams during the Nov 2011 and Feb 2012 floods has necessitated issue of an emergency license for release of 700ML of possibly contaminated water to the Namoi River valley. This shows unequivocally that the building of containment dams and engineering structures to Ã,Â"100 year flood standardsÃ,Â", as set out in the EP&A Act cannot guarantee risk-free operation and lack of impact in extreme weather events which are becoming more frequent due to the accelerating effects of global warming.

It mandates urgent re-evaluation of all such works in the adjacent Tarrawonga project, as well as the Maules Creek project before any approval or rejection can be considered.

This applies particularly to the proposed Tarrawonga Open-cut Coal Mine expansion.

The proposed "permanent" re-alignment of Goonbri Creek and associated voids and embankments of the expanded mining project area are likely to cause serious flooding and impacts in the Goonbri Creek catchment. The disturbance of surface water flows from the existing mine due to the overburden embankments has directed large volumes of mine water from within the project area onto the flood plain during the Nov 2011 and Feb 2012 floods. This has also happened in the associated Boggabri Coal mine project area, forcing a licensed discharge of 700ML of water from the coal pit to the Namoi River Ã,Â- a clear case of cumulative impacts

The increased project area in the Goonbri Creek Catchment due to the mine expansion will exacerbate this issue. This is unacceptable because Goonbri Creek is a major component of the groundwater recharge for the area of Barbers Lagoon and the township of Boggabri. The mine expansion should halt 300m prior to Goonbri Creek and leave the creek in its current, natural and permanent location.
Unacceptable cumulative impacts of open-cut mining
The clearing of 397 Ha of Native Vegetation including some vegetation in the Leard State Forest increases the cumulative impact to the Leard Forest from the Boggabri Coal and Maules Creek Coal mines. This Forest is PUBLIC LAND and is being provided to a largely foreign owned company for private profit.
Rehabilitation of the project area will be by spreading a thin layer of topsoil over the overburden embankment. This is not sufficient to ensure the water holding capacity that can sustain White Box and other native trees currently found in the area.
The plan to leave a final void where there was native vegetation is not best practice. The void does not return the land to its pre-mining land capability and creates an evaporative pump that permanently negatively impacts on the ground water.
The water contained in the final void will increase in toxicity and be a threat to native animals in the area and as shown in the recent flood event could be a major threat to the floodplain.
For all these reasons I ask that the proposed extension of the Tarrawonga coal mine be rejected.

Submission by Beth Williams, 25 the Avenue, Armidale NSW 2350, phone 02 6772 4454

I do not support the expansion of this mine. mainly because of the known detrimental effects to the natural environment these sort of "development " is bound to result in but also the detrimental effects that these smash and grab operations. will have on the future generations of local residents.

I do not support the exploitation of public natural resorces and public environmental assets for the benefit of few (mainly over seas) company's.

This is Australia, this is 2012..... wake up, profit is not everything.

I object to these developments for the following reasons; The proposed "permanent" re-alignment of Goonbri Creek which is a 4th order stream in good to excellent condition, will turn a natural asset into a drain. The mine should halt 300m prior to Goonbri Creek and leave the creek in its current, natural and permanent location. Goonbri Creek is a major component of the groundwater recharge for the area of Barbers Lagoon and the township of Boggabri.
The clearing of 397 Ha of Native Vegetation including some vegetation in the Leard State Forest. The consequence of this clearing is to increase the cumulative impact to the Leard Forest from the Boggabri Coal and Maules Creek Coal mines. This Forest is PUBLIC LAND and is being provided to a largely foreign owned company for private profit.
The project area will be rehabilitated by spreading a thin layer of topsoil over the overburden embankment. This is not sufficient to ensure the water holding capability can sustain White Box and other native trees which are currently found in the area.
The disturbance of surface water flows from the existing mine due to the overburden embankments has directed large volumes of mine water from within the project area onto the flood plain during the Nov 2011 and Feb 2012 floods. The increased project area in the Goonbri Creek Catchment due to the mine expansion will exasperate this issue.
The plan to leave a final void where there was native vegetation is not best practice. The void does not return the land to its pre-mining land capability and creates an evaporative pump that permanently negatively impacts on the ground water.
The water contained in the final void will increase in toxicity and be a threat to native animals in the area and as shown in the recent flood event could be a major threat to the floodplain.

The proposed expansion of the Tarrawonga Mine near Boggabri should not be allowed to go ahead.

This action would continue to replace Leard State Forest with a hole in the ground and a plateau of overburden. There is already little enough of this original woodland left on the Liverpool Plains. In spite of assurances by environmental managers for the mines, the animals displaced by the clearing will not just move into adjacent bushland. This bushland already contains its carrying capacity of native animals. And other nearby lands are all cleared.

This is a lovely patch of bushland which cannot be recreated by mine rehabilitation. Nor will plans to establish a plantation forest on the site be successful. All trees, native white box or plantation, require more than a thin layer of topsoil laid on top of overburden and a scattering of dead trees to establish successfully.

You can't just realign the Goonbri Creek and expect the ecosystems to re-establish at the new site. The realignment is effectively a drain which will disturb recharge areas for natural wetlands (Barber's Lagoon) and Boggabri town water supply.

The impact of disturbances to natural water flow and aquifers are unpredictable. Large volumes of mine water have already been redirected onto the flood plain during recent flood events. Aquifers will be drained by the hole in the ground. Other areas will become contaminated swamps.

The long-term cumulative impacts of this and other adjacent mines on this publicly owned land should be considered together. The transfer of this public asset for private profit by a largely foreign-owned company eats into our inheritance for future generations.

I speak from knowledge of the area. I am on the Namoi Community Conservation Area Advisory Committee which is responsible for advising on Leard State Forest. While I am not expressing the opinion of the committee, I would like to point out that we were neither informed nor consulted on this matter.

There are many environmental reasons to oppose the expansion of the Tarrawonga coal project, not least because the clearing of parts of a Leard State Forest, a public asset, is for private profit, largely profit that will leave Australia.

The realignment of Goonbri Creek, will not only effect the health of the creek but also the groundwater recharge for the neighouring lagoon and the township of Boggabri.

Rehabilitation plans are inadequate and will not return the area to anything like its current health. Of particular concern is future water quality, and the added danger of the spread of toxicity in years of heavy rain like this one. One need only look at the flow of water from the existing mine and the disturbance of the embankments for evidence of future degradation.

Patsy Asch for SLA

Please reject coal mining expansion in Boggabri area. Reject greedy unsustainable industries. Protect the natural environment and food security for future generations.