The owner of Chinese coal carrier Shen Neng One that ran aground in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in 2010 has told a court remediation is not necessary.

The Commonwealth is suing Shenzhen Energy Transport for $120 million to fix environmental damage to Douglas Shoal off the central Queensland coast.

The trial in the Federal Court in Brisbane heard the 2010 grounding damaged a 40-hectare area and left behind hundreds of kilograms of paint flakes containing the anti-fouling agent tributyltin (TBT), which is lethal to marine life.

In his opening statement, the barrister acting for Shenzhen Energy Transport, Julian Sexton, disputed remediation was necessary, saying the area had been healing naturally.

"Our preferred ecological response to what's there is to do nothing," he said.

"There's been six-and-a-half years of natural remediation."

Mr Sexton also cited the high cost, saying the remediation proposed by the Commonwealth that involved effectively vacuuming up contaminated sediment from the seabed, loading it onto a boat and bringing it ashore, would do more ecological damage.

"The remedy proposed by the Commonwealth involves killing everything that's living in the sediment areas over the area of 52 hectares or greater," he said.

Mr Sexton said tests on marine life in the affected area revealed they had higher "eco-toxicity levels", but there was not a "qualitative" difference when considering their "health, vigour and diversity".

"The amount of TBT ... that can be ingested by living organisms is not such that remediation is required," he said.

"Our fundamental point is that the health, diversity and numbers of biota at the worst-impacted site is such that your honour will comfortably conclude that whatever the science says about possibility is not happening at the Douglas Shoal."

Mr Sexton said even if the company were to pay damages, its experts had calculated the figure to be $60 to $70 million, rather than the $120 million the Commonwealth was seeking.

The trial is expected to run until the end of the month.