Exclusive : public notice on proposal was placed in classifieds of paper in Queensland town of Emerald

This article is more than 11 months old

This article is more than 11 months old

A Clive Palmer-controlled company has applied for a mining lease and environmental authority to build a massive coalmine four times the size of Adani’s in the Queensland Galilee Basin.

The Galilee Coal project – formerly called China First – has not progressed since it gained federal environmental approval in late 2013.

Notification that Waratah Coal has renewed its 2011 application for a mining lease and environmental authority was issued by Queensland’s coal assessment hub on 4 October.

The only public notice advising people to comment on the proposal – by a deadline of 2 December – was placed in the classifieds section of a weekly newspaper based in the central Queensland town of Emerald on Friday.

Waratah Coal has been contacted for comment.

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The proposed mine is about 100km from Adani’s Carmichael project and would require many of its own pieces of supporting infrastructure. Waratah Coal plans to build two open-cut pits, four underground mines – removing a total of 40m tonnes a year – and a 453km railway linking the project to the Adani-owned Abbot Point coal terminal near Bowen.

Waratah Coal is also seeking federal environmental approval for its proposed Alpha North coalmine in the Galilee Basin.

Carmichael is the most advanced of seven large mine proposals in the Galilee Basin. While many question the economics of projects that require new infrastructure and long-distance haulage to reach ports, there has been considerable interest in whether other proponents would follow Adani by seeking to progress their plans, which in some cases have been dormant for several years.

Palmer, who has said he deliberately “polarised the electorate” with a $60m advertising spend before this year’s federal election, also unveiled plans to build a coal-fired power station in central Queensland a week before polling day.

In July, Palmer indicated he could use cash from a windfall court win against the Chinese firm Citic to progress his plans in the Galilee. He told the Australian Financial Review he might seek to use an underground sludge pipeline to export coal rather than building a railway.

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“A pipeline is much more environmentally friendly, it’s underground, it could be powered by solar power on the surface, using renewable energy,” he said.

Lock the Gate coordinator Carmel Flint said it was unclear whether Waratah Coal had done additional work on water impacts, which had been required by the Queensland coordinator general.

“It’s potentially a quick process to get a mining lease or environmental authority. I’d imagine people will object to this. There will be water impacts, so I imagine there will be a lot of concerns.”