Santos has ditched plans to release untreated coal seam gas wastewater into a Queensland river that provides critical habitat to two species of threatened “bum-breathing” turtles.
But the oil and gas company is still seeking approval to release “reverse osmosis treated” CSG wastewater into the Dawson River – a practice that an independent scientific committee found could still affect the critically endangered white-throated snapping turtle and the vulnerable Fitzroy River turtle.
Santos has approval to dig an additional 6,100 gas wells near Roma, in the state’s south-west.
The federal government ruled last year that the plan to pump resulting wastewater into the Dawson River must be assessed under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act due to the “unacceptable” risk it could pose to the turtles.
The Independent Expert Scientific Committee on Coal Seam Gas and Large Coal Mining Development handed a report to the government in July, finding that the release of untreated water could have “major impacts” on about 12km of the Dawson River currently untouched by water releases, including directly and indirectly exposing the turtles to contaminants.
But it also found even treated water released into the river could have a range of negative impacts, creating conditions that favour invasive species and further disadvantage the already stressed turtles.
It also noted the treated water would still contain chemicals used in CSG operations “as well as geogenics that may adversely impact EPBC Act-listed turtles and other biota”.
Santos has not changed plans to release 18 megalitres of “reverse osmosis treated” CSG wastewater into the river every day under its Fairview water release scheme.
In a letter to regulators, Santos said it had sought approval to release unlimited amounts of untreated wastewater during the early phases of field development as a “contingency” option for times of heavy flow, which could have been up to 52 times a year, “due to uncertainty in rates and volumes” of its water production.
Since then the company had achieved “greater certainty in water production rates” and now considered the contingency as “no longer required”.
The news received a mixed reaction from environmental campaigners, who celebrated the fact Santos backed down from the release of untreated water but remained concerned about the release of treated water.
The Lock the Gate Alliance’s Queensland coordinator, Ellie Smith, said the white-throated snapping turtle was “extremely sensitive to water disturbances” and that the federal environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, needed to “put a stop to this project” if the government was serious about ending the “extinction crisis”.
“More broadly, the ongoing expansion of the unconventional gas industry in Queensland threatens many more species because it industrialises and pollutes landscapes while simultaneously driving the climate crisis,” Smith said.
