Ancient giant trees and threatened birds, mammals and ecosystems are being sacrificed for a ring road south of Perth approved by the Albanese government, leading conservationists say.
Habitat for the critically endangered western ringtail possum and endangered black cockatoos will be allowed to be cleared for a section of the $1.25bn Bunbury outer ring road.
The road proposal by the Western Australia government was approved at the end of June by a department official acting on behalf of the new federal environment minister, Tanya Plibersek.
Conservationists pointed out it came after Plibersek had received and read the five-yearly state of the environment report, which found Australia’s natural heritage was in poor and deteriorating health, with land-clearing playing a significant role.
Launching the report last Tuesday, Plibersek noted that more than 7.7m hectares of threatened species habitat across the continent had been cleared between 2000 and 2017. She described the report as “shocking” and said “too much clearing has already occurred”.
The ring road proposal includes 10km of dual-carriageway outside Bunbury that cuts through the Gelorup environmental corridor, which is home to critically endangered western ringtail possums, black cockatoos and tiny black-stripe minnow fish.
A coalition of conservationists and locals, including former WA Labor premier Carmen Lawrence, have written to Plibersek expressing fears the state’s main roads agency will not be able to meet the environmental conditions placed on the project, including providing offsets for the affected species and ecosystems.
In a second letter sent on Monday, the Friends of Gelorup Corridor group urged the minister to stop the project and investigate a lower-impact route for the road.
“It’s inexplicable,” said the environmentalist and former Greens leader Bob Brown, who is among those lobbying against the development. “These rare and endangered species and woodlands and ancient trees are being sacrificed for no gain.”
Brown said the road had been flagged for almost a quarter of a century, and an alternative route was proposed that would run over areas that had already been cleared.
“We were being warned back then about an extinction crisis, and now we’re in it. This is everything that is wrong with environmental decision-making and the absence of any green cop on the job,” he said.
Dr Sue Chapman, a urologist and vice-president of Friends of Gelorup Corridor, said: “We understand it would be extraordinary to overturn an approval, but there is new information available now that she could use to ask for a further independent review of the decision.”
Chapman said the environmental corridor was critical to the affected species because much of the area surrounding it had been cleared for housing, industry and farming. Almost 70 hectares of possum and cockatoo habitat will be allowed to be cleared, including up to 1,088 trees.
She said the critically endangered possum species was also being threatened by heatwaves, with reports of many falling from trees during extreme conditions last December. “This will push these possums in the south-west to extinction,” she said.
The corridor includes two types of ecological areas recognised nationally as threatened – Banksia and Tuart woodlands. Four hectares of Tuart woodland and 24 hectares of Banksia woodland can be cleared under the approval.
The group is also worried about the fate of four trees that are more than a hundred years old, including a woody pear thought to be 175 years old, two moodjars and a holly-leaf banksia at 200 years old.
In the latest letter to Plibersek, the group said construction fencing was already being erected and this had stopped a scientific survey of 152 GPS-marked tree hollows.
Dr Joe Fontaine, a forest ecologist at Murdoch University, said the state government was historically responsible for most clearing of the Banksia and Tuart woodlands and forests.
“The state of the environment report was pretty clear that we can’t have any more clearing,” he said. “These ecological communities are recognised federally as threatened, so on what planet is it OK to do this?”
Under conditions set by the minister, work cannot start until she has approved plans from the Western Australian government’s main roads agency to manage the impact on the threatened species, habitats and woodlands.
“This is a horrible mess, but it can be fixed and there is still time to get this right,” Brown said. “There are good options, including an alternative route.”
He said that a requirement to put areas aside as offsets for the places being cleared would not work. Offsets were a “scam”, he said. “If you want to protect those species, then you put the ring road over the paddock next door.”
Guardian Australia put questions to Plibersek’s office. They were referred to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water.
In a statement, the department said the road was approved with conditions that would manage impacts, including the requirement to prepare management plans. It said any work affecting the threatened species and woodlands could not start until those plans were finalised.
“In addition, the department requires Main Roads WA to provide environmental offsets to compensate for impacts to black cockatoos, western ringtail possum, banksia woodlands and Tuart woodlands and forests,” the statement said.
In a statement, Main Roads WA said alternative routes for the southern section of the ring road had been investigated, but had found “there wasn’t a suitable alignment with lesser environmental impacts.”
Environmental management plans had been completed and sent to Plibersek’s department this month and set out how the project could meet the conditions set by the minister. Work was expected to start soon.
“These plans include many complex conditions, including those relating to baseline and ongoing fauna surveys, a western ringtail possum behaviour study, predator control, clearing controls and staging, fauna crossings.”
Surveys for the endangered possums were continuing to “help us to better understand the movements of western ringtail possums in and out of the survey area”, and clearing would be carefully managed with “expert fauna spotters on site to ensure that no possum is harmed.”
The statement added: “We are currently reviewing the condition of each of the trees mentioned and opportunities to safely retain them within the road corridor.”
