Colin Boyce (Flynn, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move this motion on behalf of agriculture, on behalf of the farmers and graziers and rural communities in Australia that rely on the Great Artesian Basin as their principal water source. The Great Artesian Basin is unique. It is the only one of its kind on the planet. It is the world's largest underground potable water source. It covers an area of something like 1.7 million square kilometres over three states and one territory in Australia. It is estimated to carry 65,000 cubic kilometres of water. It is the eighth wonder of the world, if you like!

As we all know, there was a proposal by Glencore, through their subsidiary company CTSCo, to pump 330,000 tonnes of hypercritical CO2 fluid into the precipice sandstone water aquifer of the Great Artesian Basin. This was a trial at Moonie, in Central Queensland. If it was given approval, they intended to take that to industrial scale, and, according to their EIS statement, pump 730 million tonnes of hypercritical fluid into that precipice sandstone water aquifer. The precipice sandstone water aquifer is the deepest and best water aquifer of the Great Artesian Basin.

When this proposal was examined by the Queensland environment office, they found that what would happen is the pH value of the water would be lowered and the water would become acid. As such, it ran the possibility of eroding the geological formations down there and releasing heavy metal such as lead and arsenic into the water. It also found the precipice sandstone was not a confined aquifer. In fact, if you live in Central Queensland, where I come from, all the way along the Central Queensland escarpment is the precipice sandstone. That geological feature, those enormous great big white cliffs—that's where they come out of the ground, and that is where the precipice sandstone springs are. That's where all that water in the springs originates from, deep underground. The further south you go, the deeper it gets.

The Queensland government, in their wisdom—and kudos to them—moved some legislation to effectively ban carbon capture storage in Queensland. One of the problems we've got is that this issue is not finished. We need to make New South Wales, South Australia and the Northern Territory follow suit. As I said, the Great Artesian Basin covers all those states and territories, and it's really important we recognise the waters of the Great Artesian Basin for what they are—a geological feature that is extremely important to agriculture.

There was a Senate inquiry into the whole issue, and it made two recommendations. One:

The committee recommends that states and territories consider a legislated ban on CCS activities across the GAB to ensure this important natural asset is uniformly preserved.

and two:

The committee recommends updating the water trigger in the EPBC Act to include onshore CCS.

This is what we are asking the Minister for the Environment and Water to do.

Late last year the National Party moved amendments in the lower house to enable the water trigger through the EPBC Act to put some protections around the waters of the Great Artesian Basin in respect of carbon capture storage. These amendments were defeated by both the government and the Greens. It is absolutely outrageous; it is staggering hypocrisy from the government and the Greens not to support those amendments. The Great Artesian Basin is the world's largest underground potable water source. It deserves to be protected at all costs for future generations and for agriculture. Australia is the driest habitable continent. It is absolutely outrageous that somebody would even suggest we use it as a suppository for industrial waste.

I'll leave it there. I hope the minister is listening, and I hope she follows through.

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