Major parties want ‘sustainable logging’ in native forests, but experts warn of ‘endgame’ for endangered species and drinking water

To understand the campaign to save Victoria’s old growth forests, ecologist David Lindenmayer says, you just need to turn on a tap in Melbourne.

Forget about the critically endangered Leadbeater’s possum, a species in which Lindenmayer is a global expert, or the vulnerable greater glider. Forget, too, about the carbon value of the mountain ash forests of the Victorian central highlands, which are among the most carbon-dense forests in the world.

“Even if you couldn’t give a shit about cuddly soft endangered animals, or biodiversity, or the environment – if you’re interested in drinking water, then you actually need to have intact forests, intact catchments to produce that water,” Lindenmayer says.

These forests are at the heart of one of the key environmental issues that voters in Victoria will have to decide when they head to the polls on Saturday. And unlike the transition to renewable energy, where Labor has taken a lead, the major parties are in lockstep.

According to conservationists, both issues are equally pressing. And if the decision to stop logging is put off much longer, Lindenmayer says, there may not be a forest to save.

‘It really is endgame’

About 15% of the forests in eastern Victoria, some 450,000ha, is currently earmarked as suitable for logging. The average harvest over the past five years is a historically low 3,000ha per annum. A revised native timber release plan will be released after the election.

The Wilderness Society’s Victorian campaign manager, Amelia Young, says for both the timber industry and the forests to survive, the wood supply contracts need to be switched to 100% plantation sources.

“It really is endgame,” Young says. “The forests aren’t a magic pudding and they can’t keep providing wood forever and that crunch time is happening right now, it’s upon us.”

State-owned forester VicForests failed an application for Forest Stewardship Council certification for its native forests last year, and major timber retailer Bunnings has said it will not stock Victorian native timber past 2020 unless it is FSC-certified.

“It’s very difficult to see how VicForests will be able to continue to log those high conservation value forests and get that gold-standard certification,” Young says.

Conservationists are campaigning for the establishment of a great forests national park, which would lock up 355,000ha of high conservation value mountain ash forests in the central highlands and east Gippsland.

Lindenmayer says it is “absolutely essential” for the survival of threatened species.

It would also close off the water catchment for Thomson Dam, which holds 60% of Melbourne’s water reserves. According to a recent paper by Lindenmayer, failure to do so will cost the state the equivalent of the water use of 600,000 people per year.

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Labor promised to investigate the creation of a great forests national park before the 2014 election but has since backed away, citing a lack of consensus from a taskforce of conservationists and industry formed to investigate the proposal.

In 2017 it bought the failing Heyfield sawmill at a reported cost of $40m and promised to guarantee a timber supply. The purchase came months after the closure of the Hazelwood power station, when the Latrobe Valley was struggling for jobs.

The environment minister, Lily D’Ambrosio, tells Guardian Australia Labor will “continue to work with industry, unions and environmental groups to ensure Victoria continues to have a sustainable forestry industry”.

D’Ambrosio says Labor’s forestry policy is not influenced by union lobbyists.

In 2016 the forestry sector employed 16,713 people in Victoria, a 30% drop on the 2011 figure of 21,000 jobs, which is still commonly cited by government. Of those, only 1,300 were employed in the native forest industry; the rest worked in plantations.

The Coalition also voted against the national park proposal.

Only the Greens support it, and have been campaigning heavily on the issue on the inner-city marginal seats of Brunswick and Richmond, where they stand a chance of a historic win over Labor.

A poll commissioned by the Victorian National Parks Association last week found that 69.9% of voters supported the creation of a great forests national park, including 83% of Labor voters.

“Protecting the environment and nature has been a big failure of this government,” says Greens environment spokeswoman Ellen Sandell. “They have done some good things around renewable energies but they have done very, very little on the environment.”

The energy picture

Renewable energy has been a different story. In 2016 the Andrews government set a target of generating 25% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020 – a target that was almost immediately met with the closure of Hazelwood – and 40% by 2025.

In recent weeks it promised to extend that target to 50% by 2030 if re-elected. D’Ambrosio has previously said Victoria will hold to its renewable energy target even without a federal commitment.

Since 2014, more than 3,000MW of new renewable energy generation capacity has been either built or contracted in Victoria, about 900MW of which was commissioned through the first round of the Victorian renewable energy target auction.

The Greens proposal is for a target of 100% by 2030. That is in line with the recommendations of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which said Victoria should close its three remaining coal-fired power stations by 2030.

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Yallourn power station is slated to close by 2032. Loy Yang A, which together with Loy Yang B currently produces about 50% of the states energy requirements, is due to close no later than 2048.

The Coalition has suggested adding a fourth coal-fired power station, in defiance of the IPCC recommendations. It has also promised to scrap the renewable target.

The opposition leader, Matthew Guy, says the proposed new 500MW power station could be supplied by any source provided it could produce dispatchable power and be online by about 2021.

The director of Green Energy Markets, Tristan Edis, said the winning bid was likely to be some form of renewable energy supported by a gas generator or battery capacity. He said a coal-fired power station, while cheap, could not be built in three years.

The chief executive of Environment Victoria, Mark Wakeham, is less optimistic.

“I think the Coalition has demonstrated that it is ideologically opposed to supporting renewable energy,” he says.

Guy says building the new power station will save households an average of $355 a year on their electricity bill, but Edis says that calculation requires the wholesale electricity price to drop to almost zero on current household consumption data.

Guardian Australia contacted the Coalition to verify its modelling but did not get a response.

All three parties have rooftop solar policies: Labor has offered rebates to both homeowners and renters to put panels on 700,000 residential properties; the Greens propose putting solar panels on all public schools and public housing; and the Coalition has also proposed installing solar panels and batteries in 700 public schools by 2025.

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The Coalition has also promised subsidies of 50% on new low-energy televisions and 40% on low-energy fridges purchased by people with an appropriate concession card.

All three parties support a ban on fracking, but the Coalition has dropped its opposition to exploration and drilling for conventional onshore gas, saying “it complements our position on renewable energy and provides a clear alternative” to the Vert.

Labor has pledged to enshrine its current ban on fracking into the state constitution, which would require a special majority of both houses of parliament. Andrews told reporters on Friday he was confident of securing that majority.