Across Eastern Australia disputes are erupting between coal mining corporations and farmers over extraction of coal seam gas (CSG). Under current legislation farmers only own their topsoil. Licensed mining companies are entitled to enter farms to carry out drilling or other operations.
Farmers may take legal action, but if they lose the case their only safeguards are the minor restrictions imposed in some states. CSG mining is banned within 200 metres of a house or 50 metres of a garden in NSW. The government of Queensland (which now has $46 billion in CSG investments) has imposed a ban on mining within two kilometres of towns, and other states have limitations, but none of them pose a real obstacle to the mining juggernauts. Read More
The Guardian
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