We share the distress and frustration as per the media statements released last week by Lock the Gate, Queensland Conservation Council and Mackay Conservation Group about the approval of the Middlemount coal mine extension – February 2026.
Australia has been experiencing several unprecedented heatwaves this summer with temperatures hotter than any other place on our planet, but the Australian government is pouring petrol on the fire by approving new coal mining projects that will cause the exacerbation of this extreme heat and other extreme weather events. This is because these projects emit large amounts of greenhouse gases that are making our atmosphere denser and prevent heat from escaping, pushing earth into an energy imbalance and causing earth’s surface, atmosphere and oceans to get hotter and hotter.
We call for the Albanese government to protect Australians from extreme heat and unnatural disasters, not endanger our communities and nature by approving new coal mines that will super charge global heating, disasters amd nature destruction.
Climate impacted communities have had enough. How many more deadly heatwaves, destructive floods and raging bushfires do communities have to endure before our government takes real climate action and stops approving new coal mines? Approving new sources of climate pollution is the opposite of taking meaningful action on climate change! With every new coal mine they approved, the government is burning our future and their own credibility. They risk the destruction of important habitat and the extinction of threatened species like Australia’s iconic koala and the greater glider. Australia is also turning its back on its Pacific neighbours. Pacific leaders have been calling for climate action and no new fossil fuel approvals, which the government simply ignores.
The expansion will clear over 180 hectares of koala habitat. The presence of koalas and greater gliders utilising this important riparian habitat was recorded on surveys conducted by the coal company. Surveys also noted the woodland along the creek is dominated by Queensland Blue gum, a preferred food source for koalas, and supports hollow bearing trees that provide important denning habitat for greater gliders.
The project plans to divert Roper Creek around the proposed open-cut pit and realigning the southern flood levee. This will alter natural flow regimes, destroy riparian vegetation, increase erosion risk, and cut habitat connectivity.
The Independent Expert Scientific Committee (IESC) advice identified the potential impacts from this project are:
-
Reduction of riparian habitat and disruption of continuity of the riparian zone along several km of Roper Creek during and soon after its realignment, impacting arboreal and other species and affecting instream ecological processes,
-
Legacy of two residual voids (becoming increasingly saline) in a floodplain area,
-
A potential decrease in surface water quality from controlled discharge and uncontrolled overflow events, for example overtopping of sediment dams releasing contaminated water and sediments downstream, and
-
Cumulative impacts to groundwaters and surface waters and their dependent ecosystems
Background on Yancoal and Peabody’s Middlemount Coal Mine – Southern Open Cut Extension Project
The Middlemount coal mine is jointly owned by US company Peabody and Chinese company Yancoal. The mine is near Middlemount in Central Queensland’s Bowen Basin on Barada Barna Country and is currently approved to extract 5.7 million tonnes of metallurgical and thermal coal each year for export.
The Middlemount Coal Mine – Southern Open Cut Extension Project seeks to divert a 4.5km section of Roper creek to dig a new open cut pit and extend the life of the project for an additional 7 years until 2044.
Images and footage of the proposed extension area, including Roper creek, are here
Coal production and pollution:
The proposed project would extract an additional 112 million tonnes of coal and mining in the new open cut pit would extend the life of the mine for an additional 7 years, from 2037 until 2044.
The project would produce 236 million tonnes of carbon pollution from the burning of the coal that is exported, equivalent to more than half of Australia’s annual domestic emissions from all sources in 2024-25 (440.2 million tonnes) and 1200 times more than the annual emissions of Vanuatu (197,079 tonnes).
Further reading:
Submission on the EPBC assessment of the project by Environmental Advocacy Central Queensland
The Middlemount coal mine extension is featured as a case study in the ‘Koalas not Coal’ report released last year by a coalition of environment and climate organisations.