I am calling on the government to institute a moratorium on gas fracking (including exploration) in WA until enforceable regulations can guarantee fracking activities will not have any adverse impacts on WA’s environment or public health, and will not result in any contamination of groundwater aquifers.

Two separate independent reports (an Auditor General’s review and the Hunter Report) have found that the Government’s preferred approach to regulating fracking is totally inadequate. The reports have found that the Department of Mines and Petroleum lacks the legal powers to hold the gas industry to account and that the Department is comprehensively failing in its duties to manage the environmental impact of all mining activity in WA. Given these alarming findings, I do not have any confidence in the Government’s current approach to regulating fracking activity in WA.

The following minimum standards must apply before any gas fracking activities are allowed to take place in WA:

• A requirement for rigorous independent testing of all chemicals before they are used, to demonstrate that drilling and fracking operations will have no adverse impacts on groundwater, human health and the environment;
• independent assessment of the cumulative impact of gas fracking proposals (including surface operations, groundwater impacts and carbon pollution) to demonstrate that the activities will not have an adverse impact on WA’s unique ecosystems or agricultural lands;
• absolute transparency is provided to the public about the chemicals used in all unconventional gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing (‘fracking’) activities;
• public release of all other information relating to environmental management and compliance by the fracking industry, including proponent documentation, management plans, compliance reports and groundwater and environmental monitoring data;
• any liability for contamination of ground water, land or community assets or greenhouse emissions due to methane leakage to be borne by the company conducting the operations rather than the State and people of Western Australia;
• private and Indigenous landholders have a legal veto to prevent gas fracking activities occurring on their lands;
• no reduction of groundwater levels as a result of water use in gas fracking operations;
• no uncontrolled methane leakage from drilled locations, wellheads or borefields;
• no reduction in available agricultural land in WA.

I do not believe that natural gas produced by fracking is a sustainable energy source, or one that should be relied upon for Western Australia’s future energy needs. Studies show that carbon pollution from LNG production is similar to that produced from coal burning.  I support a rapid expansion of renewable energy sources to meet our state’s future energy needs, not a reliance on dirty fossil fuels like coal and LNG that have a damaging impact on our environment and our climate.