The Ensham Mine extension project will produce around 4.5 million tonnes of coal each year ten years, resulting in emissions equivalent to running a coal fired power station for 15 years. Owned mainly by Japanese conglomerate Idemitsu, the mine produces coal for export and the Gladstone Power Station. This approval allows it to run until 2045.

Minister Plibersek recently refused to reconsider Ensham’s climate impacts on matters of national environmental significance. According to the Living Wonders team she “decided the climate harms identified in thousands of pages of evidence are not relevant to her risk assessment for this project.”

Good one.

Interestingly, the other two mines that the Minister refused to reassess on climate grounds are being contested by the Living Wonders team in the Federal Court. Ensham appears not to be a part of that action and so has been formally approved by Minister Plibersek.