Wake up call needed

Comment From Greatlatrobe Park

UNDER current arrangements, enormous ugly and inaccessible wastelands are adefinitepossibility in the future for abandoned Latrobe Valley mine sites. As aresult, Great Latrobe Park (GLP) is becoming increasingly alarmed at the apparent lack of meaningful action by the state government regarding mine void rehabilitation and potential repurposing.

While it has agreed to directEngie to conduct an Environmental Effects Study, this has major limitations, notably that it will clearly advantage the first mover, Engie,over Yallournand Loy Yang. It is obvious that the government has put mine rehabilitationinto the 'toohard basket' and is simply hoping that something will turn up to solve the problem.

They did set up the Mine Land Rehabilitation Authority, in the process tossingaround much 'community consultation' and 'trust us' rhetoric, but as yet there is little evidence of sensible, properly informed, and appropriate strategic planning There is much potential for irreversible damage to our community and environment along with erosionofour quality of life if we simply stand aside and let foreign commercial interests and political expediency take over.

Those of us who are oldermight notbemuch affected, but our children and grandchildren will most certainly be.

There is an 'elephant in the room' that could well inflict much harm if not properly managed, and the community deserves much more than to be treated as bystanders. We have, after all, provided the state with the power needed to sustain arobust economy for more than acentury, and endured more than our shareofpollution,dramas and toxic emissions.

Arecent series of 'technical studies' concluded that themost practical and economically feasible treatment of disused mine voids is to fill them up withwatertomakethem “safe, stable and sustainable” -asthe current mantra goes.

This technique is not only unprecedented on such avast scale, but is untested and so far lacks the scrutiny of adetailed study.

Importantly, the studiesconductedtodatestress that there is unlikely to be anywhere enough available water to achieve complete filling of all the voids-unlessitrains veryheavily for years to come! This has big consequences for ourregion and the health of our environment, especiallyas thereisnoneed, fromastability perspective, to completely fill anyofthe mine voids withwater.

GLP will continue to promote discussion on this vital issue and more communicationwill soon be forthcoming.

It is the intentionofthe group to encourage the community to take more control overits future and not allow itself to be ignored or steamrolled.

Alot is at stake.

Greater Latrobe Park is aproject, who's vison is that the repurposed Latrobe Valley open cuts and associated areas become treasured assets.