Yesterday about 30 lovely people joined POWA and braved the polar blast to visit four creeks impacted by coal mine pollution in the Illawarra. It was great! We had a nice crowd of Wollongong locals, as well as some friends from Sydney who stuck around after May Day.
WIN News Illawarra did a great story about the convoy and the ongoing issues with stream pollution — watch it here.
If you missed the convoy, you can take yourself on the tour by having a look at the flyer below.
POWA debuted our fancy new banner at the HUGE May Day march in Port Kembla on Saturday. We joined thousands of unionists and local people calling for a green future with good jobs for the Illawarra. It was great.
12 noon, Saturday May 6, Wentworth Street, Port Kembla
POWA will be marching with a “Sustainable Jobs Now: Stop Mining in Our Water Catchment” banner
Find the South Coast Labour Council Facebook event here
Its been a long time coming, but POWA is organising a follow-up to our Water Catchment Convoy of 2020. This time, we will be keeping it local, and visiting the suburban creeks of the Illawarra that we know and love – and have been impacted by the local coal mines we have been campaigning against for the last 5 years.
Come along, learn about your local waterways, and feel inspired to fight to protect the waterways that provide habitat and make our area a more-lovely place to live.
We will be starting from Lowden Square (eastern side of Wollongong Train Station) at 10am, and heading southwards to:
– Collins Creek, Woonona
– Bellambi Creek, Bellambi
– Allens Creek, Unanderra
– Brandy and Water Creek, Figtree
… and finishing up at Mt Kembla for a lovely picnic, wrapping up around 2pm.
We will have a mini bus, but will also need some people to bring their own cars for the tour.
Keep an eye on the Facebook event for more info closer to the date.
Our friends at Stop Russell Vale Mine are holding a community picket next Friday 14th April, from 8am, at the main gate of the Russell Vale Colliery! You can find the Facebook event here.
Get down there, bring a friend, stop some coal trucks, and learn the new smash hit campaign theme song “No Diggety”. Keen beans can get a head start on learning the lyrics – find the track here.
MEDIA RELEASE
4th April, 2023
New South32 report details permanent damage to swamps and creeks by Dendrobium Mine
Wollongong, New South Wales — Further detail on the ongoing extensive damage caused by South32’s Dendrobium Mine has come to light, showing sustained damage to creeks, swamps and waterfalls close to the edge of Lake Avon. The mining multinational published its Longwall 18 End of Panel Report (1) at the end of 2022, documenting the fresh damage caused by its longwall mining operations within the Special Areas of the Greater Sydney Water Catchment.
Detailed in this report are impacts on streams, creeks, upland swamps, and waterfalls in the Longwall 18 footprint, which measures 1000m x 300m, or the size of 220 rugby league fields. The report documents 24 new identified surface impacts, all of which were observed on “natural features”.
South32 recently withdrew its application for a 20 year extension to the Dendrobium Mine, but will continue to conduct longwall mining within the water catchment for several more years.
Protect Our Water Alliance (POWA) spokesperson Dr Rada Germanos said “This report provides us with the most up-to-date evidence of the incredible damage that South32’s longwall mining is causing in our water catchment areas. South32 ripped out this longwall in five months, but they have left behind permanent damage to the landscape and ecology of the area.”
“This report details significant and sustained damage to all of the upland swamps in the survey area, with the worst impacts on Swamp 1B. There is also clear documentation of damage to Donalds Castle Creek and Wongawilli Creek, with reduction in water pooling and reduction in terrestrial and aquatic habitat. The most galling part is that all of this damage is just another chapter in the long archive of environmental destruction that has been pre-approved by the NSW Department of Planning”
“These swamps and creeks are vital to the health of the ecosystems of the Illawarra. And we know that these swamps and creeks, once cracked and damaged, don’t recover. This report gives us real-time evidence from South32 themselves of the damage that longwall mining is causing each and every day. This is why we are calling for a stop to mining in the water catchment now, not just an end to new expansions or mines – because our environment is getting smashed right here and right now under the current approvals.”
The recent NSW Election saw the issue of mining in the water catchment raised at many community candidates forums. The newly-elected Labor MP for Heathcote, Maryanne Stuart, has publicly stated her opposition to mining expansions in the water catchment regions. However, the newly-elected Minns Government still supports coal mining within these sensitive areas.
“The recent election result is a welcome rejection of the former Perrotet government, one which tried to ram through the now-ditched Dendrobium Mine Expansion under SSI status, with the backing of One Nation’s Mark Latham. Will our re-elected Labor MPs Ryan Park and Paul Scully stand up for the special, sensitive places of our region, or will they continue to support the broken planning processes that rubber-stamp the destruction of our local environment and water catchment?”
References
An example of photos from the Report, detailing damage to waterways in the Longwall 18 footprint (p 30):
Listen to ABC Illawarra’s Lindsay having a chat with POWA spokesperson Rada about the South32 Dendrobium Longwall 17 End of Panel report. Thanks ABC Illawarra for giving the grassroots some airtime against the multinationals ❤
Big ups to Connor Pearce at The Merc for another great article about mining in the water catchment.
Wollongong, New South Wales — Confronting images of recent environmental destruction by South32’s Dendrobium Mine have come to light, showing cracked streams and rockfalls within the Special Areas of the Greater Sydney Water Catchment. The mining multinational published its Longwall 17 End of Panel Report (1) earlier this year, documenting the immediate environmental impacts of this particular area of mining in Area 3b.
Detailed in this report are impacts on streams, creeks, upland swamps, access roads, water losses, as well as documented Aboriginal heritage sites. The report documents 40 identified new surface impacts, 75% of which were on “natural features”.
South32 recently withdrew its application for a 20 year extension to the Dendrobium Mine, but will continue to conduct longwall mining within the water catchment for several more years.
Protect Our Water Alliance (POWA) spokesperson Dr Rada Germanos said “This report provides us with real-time evidence of the horrific damage that South32 is causing within our water catchment. It is incredible to read such a long document that lists cracked stream after cracked stream, dry swamp after dry swamp, and realise that all of this destruction has been approved by the Department of Planning.”
“Furthermore, only two of the five documented Aboriginal heritage sites were visited in the post-mining survey. First Nations people have said time and time again that longwall mining affects the cultural integrity of the landscape, and here we see an incredibly poor effort by South32 to even bother to acknowledge their destruction of these places.”
“While water drinkers in Sydney and the Illawarra are relieved that the expansion of the Dendrobium Mine will not go ahead, we remain deeply concerned that damage to our water catchment continues every day until the mining ceases.“
“This consent to destroy has been provided by successive NSW Governments. It is simply not good enough to allow multinational companies to trash these ecosystems, and document their destruction in these dry, detached reports. As the 2023 State Election draws closer, we ask, do the Labor or Liberal parties care enough about clean drinking water for the 5 million people of Greater Sydney to overhaul our planning laws, and stop this destruction by stopping mining in our water catchment?”
South32 has finished mining Longwall 17 in “Area 3b” in the Dendrobium Mine, which of course is on unceded Dharawal Country, and just north of the Avon Reservoir.
Your faithful friends here at POWA have trawled through the End of Panel report, and distilled some Dendrobium Damage for you. Spoiler alert: longwall mining is highly destructive, and South32’s contractors only appear to have surveyed a small part of the undermined (and adjacent) area.
All images are taken from the Longwall 17 End of Panel Report
If you’re super keen and want to read the report yourself, you can find it here.
Protect Our Water Alliance 