The Hunter Joint Organisation (Hunter JO) is calling for immediate financial commitments from both Federal and NSW Governments to reinvest coal royalties back into the Hunter and back a plan to repurpose existing infrastructure rather than rip it out when coal mines come to the end of their life.
The Hunter JO is made up of the Mayors of Singleton, Port Stephens, Cessnock, Dungog, Maitland, Lake Macquarie, MidCoast, Muswellbrook, Newcastle and the Upper Hunter Shire.
Singleton Mayor Sue Moore is the Chair of Hunter JO and said the crux of what they’re trying to get across is that mine infrastructure could be utilised instead of knocked down when a mine comes to the end of its life.
“Bloomfield were gracious enough to let us onto their Colliery because they are the perfect example of having infrastructure like a railway line that is going to be pulled out according to their current mine lease plan.
“We need to look at all these mine plans and more broadly than that, the future use of all mine sites.”
The Hunter JO sees the huge potential in repurposing existing infrastructure of train lines, high voltage electricity, water and good transport connections. Under the current legislation, the infrastructure needs to be removed at the end of mining operations.
Sue said sites that have infrastructure like that can be transformed to create new employment opportunities.
“We need to work these things out now so mine plans can be readjusted so that they can work towards the final landform that fits with that land use – it seems simple right?
“If train lines like the ones at Bloomfield get ripped out, no one will put them back, it just won’t happen. It’s not the kind of infrastructure you can build at the drop of a hat.
“A lot of mines are keen to progress talking about the best use of the future mining land rather than stick to their approvals from years ago. The plans are caught between compliance and planning, and no one seems to want to push ahead. We want to help by putting together a bird’s eye view of what it could look like.
“People ask me, ‘what sort of things do you want to see?’, and I always say that’s the point, to work that out. There are so many things that can be considered. We get developers come into Council all the time looking for land and often all that’s available is Council land, imagine if there was mining land we could offer?”
The Mayors are proposing to undertake a regional audit of all mining land and infrastructure across the Hunter, while simultaneously developing a pilot ‘Place Based Mine Closure Strategy’ for Singleton and Master Plans for Muswellbrook and Lake Macquarie. The cost? About $20 million which they say could be funded through coal royalties going into the project.
“It took the Black Rock project at Lake Macquarie thirty years to come to fruition and eight years for the approval alone. We can’t have that,” said Sue.
“The mines are going to continue for as long as their approvals allow, and some want to continue expanding. We need to plan for the future now, before it really is too late.”
