Deepwater drilling threatens the Great Australian Bight
Environmentalists warn that marine life is threatened by the Australian Government’s plans to set aside even more areas of the ocean for oil and gas mining this year, including the Great Australian Bight.
Deepwater drilling in the Bight could threaten endemic species and leave coastline from Western Australia to Tasmania vulnerable to devastation by oil spill, according to Greenpeace Pacific in a Feb 2018 press release
Although BP walked away from drilling the location last year, Norwegian oil giant Statoil is proposing oil wells underneath the Bight, which contains even more endemic species than the Great Barrier Reef.
“There aren’t many places in the world that haven’t been explored by oil and gas companies, so they’re always looking for oil. To make (the Bight) more attractive, the Australian Government has offered these companies tax incentives,” said Greenpeace Pacific Senior Campaigner Nathaniel Pelle.
Not only is the government allowing deepwater drilling to happen, they are encouraging companies to submit environmental impact proposals to the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA), Pelle says.
Although Minister for Resources Matt Canavan has recently announced that there would be added transparency for offshore oil and gas, in the past NOPSEMA has been criticized for not releasing information about planned drilling operations.
The government said in an August 2017 statement that their “regulatory framework only allows petroleum activities to proceed if the potential impact on the environment has been reduced to as low as reasonably practicable.”
South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon was sceptical of this statement, stating that he was “not satisfied that the burden of proof that drilling in the Great Australian Bight would not be harmful, weighing up the risks and benefits, has been met by its proponents.”
While oil spills are a known and devastating risk of drilling in the Bight, drilling brings other risks to the environment like seismic testing and pollution.
Pelle explained that seismic testing creates blasts as loud as a grenade to build images of the sediment structure of the ocean floor, which could have permanent effects on species that use sound to navigate, communicate with their families, form migration patterns, and search for food.
Seismic testing can also affect plankton, a major source of food for fish and whales that, if wiped out, would cause a chain reaction.
This could all be very damaging not only for marine life, but also for tourism and fishing industries as 25% of Australia’s seafood industry relies on the Bight.
Greenpeace is trying to inform communities along the southern coast that they are in the pathway of a potential oil spill through social media and local information sessions
Because Australia doesn’t have a formal public consultation system, most of the communities don’t know that they have a right to be involved in the decision making.
Greenpeace encourages them to write to their local governments demanding that they have a say.
Pelle says that the Great Australian Bight is not a well-known area, but “once people see how unique and beautiful it is, they will be more inclined to help.”
CONTACT LIST
INTERVIEW with Nathaniel Pelle – Senior Campaigner at Greenpeace Australia Pacific. Email address nathaniel.pelle@greenpeace.org +61 2 92630342. Interviewed by phone on 5 March 2018.
Greenpeace Press Release
https://act.greenpeace.org/page/13163/petition/1?locale=en-AU
28 Feb 2018
Australian Government response to the Environment and Communications References Committee report: Oil or gas production in the Great Australian Bight
Aug 2017
Additional Comments from Senator Nick Xenophon
Oil or gas production in the Great Australian Bight: A Precautionary Tale
Added transparency for offshore oil and gas
28 November 2017
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