IN purely economic terms, the resources boom has been a great help to Australia, helping the nation emerge relatively unscathed from a global financial crisis that is still creating havoc in Europe and the United States.
But the environmental costs have been great, as even the resource sector itself has had little choice but to accept.
Australians have benefited from relatively cheap energy generated by burning fossil fuels- a process that is heavily implicated in global warming.
And the physical impacts of resource extraction are all too evident.
As the coal industry has worked its way from the coast to the upper reaches of the Hunter Valley and beyond, the most visible legacy is a landscape ravaged by open-cut mining. And there are other costs, including damaged aquifers, land subsidence and the impacts of dust and noise on the surrounding population.
Huge areas of farming land were lost to mining in the Hunter but in recent years the conflict between mining and agriculture has become a flash-point of dispute.
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Newcastle Herald
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