- Future Gas Strategy brings more destructive offshore gas schemes & seismic blasting
- Albanese government taking advice of fossil fuel companies not scientists
- Australia needs to embrace clean energy future and its economic opportunities
- Great Barrier Reef copping possibly worst bleaching event while leading scientists say global temperatures expected to rise 2.5ºC this century
The Australian Government’s Future Gas Strategy locks in climate change, fossil fuel dependence and more destructive offshore gas schemes for our overly stressed oceans and marine life, the Australian Marine Conservation Society said today after the government announced the plan.
The timing of the Albanese government’s announcement on the Future Gas Strategy could not be worse as we see the devastating impacts of climate change, including the Great Barrier Reef undergoing possibly its worst bleaching event, while hundreds of the world’s leading scientists said today that global temperatures are expected to rise at least 2.5ºC above pre-industrial levels – far beyond the 1.5ºC target of the Paris climate agreement.
Professor Gretta Pecl, from the University of Hobart, told the Guardian: “I think we are headed for major societal disruption within the next five years. [Authorities] will be overwhelmed by extreme event after extreme event, food production will be disrupted. I could not feel greater despair over the future.”
AMCS Oil and Gas Campaign Manager Louise Morris said: “The Albanese Government seems to be taking advice from the fossil fuel companies rather than the scientists who know the massive dangers that climate change will bring. Australia needs to embrace a clean energy future and the economic opportunities it brings.
“The Labor government’s Future Gas Strategy will bring more climate change and fossil fuel dependence when we need to be rapidly transitioning to renewable energy faster than ever. It brings more risky offshore gas drilling in our overly stressed oceans, more destructive seismic blasting for our marine life and toxic carbon pollution dumping schemes under the sea floor.
“The timing of the government’s announcement on the Future Gas Strategy could not be worse as the Great Barrier Reef cops possibly its worst bleaching event, while hundreds of the world’s leading scientists saying we expect global temperatures to rise to at least 2.5oC and major societal changes as we are overwhelmed by extreme events. The government’s Future Gas Strategy will help bring such cataclysmic climate change.
“Dirty fossil fuel gas can not be a transition fuel for a clean energy economy. The best and cheapest way of ensuring affordable, reliable and clean energy supply is renewable energy.
“The ALP’s Future Gas Strategy will bring more destructive offshore gas drilling and seismic blasting, which impacts the whole marine food chain, from the very foundation, killing zooplankton, through to forcing whales from their feeding and breeding grounds.
“It brings more seismic blasting projects like TGS-SLB’s massive plans to blast 45,000 square kilometres of sea off the Victorian coast and in marine parks and blue whale habitat, and boosts the proposal by Esso/ExxonMobil to dump carbon dioxide under the ocean floor off Victoria’s Gippsland Coast.
“The Future Gas Strategy will lock in more intense and more frequent marine heatwaves that are killing the giant kelp forests of the Great Southern Reef and bleaching and killing coral on the Great Barrier Reef. The OECD’s International Energy Agency said in 2021 that we can have no new fossil fuel developments if we are to limit global warming to 1.5ºC – a critical threshold for coral reefs. Not only is the Albanese government not doing enough to battle climate change, its Future Gas Strategy will bring the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef.
“A Lowy Institute Poll has shown that 90% of Australians want more action on climate change, yet the government is ignoring the public’s calls for action and a safe climate, and bowing to the fossil fuel industries that are turbocharging climate change.”