ABC radio reports that we are now entering a “third generation” of suffering from asbestos-related disease. People who have had only minor exposure – like living in a house where asbestos has been broken during renovation – are being diagnosed with fatal illness. This substance that seemed so benign was mined and extensively used in Australia until we discovered that exposure to asbestos can cause slow and painful death. The company which profited most from asbestos, James Hardy Ltd, was made to fund a compensation scheme for victims – which has since proven to be inadequate. The company quickly moved overseas to avoid further legal liability.
We now know that asbestos was not a boon to human civilisation and neither is unconventional gas. We are already seeing medical reports that demonstrate adverse health risks associated with this new industry. We need to get the proponents of coal seam gas (CSG) mining to fund a compensation scheme – now, not after the effects of its poisonous activities become fully proven.
The world is being told that drilling through aquifers and emptying the coal seams of trapped water that contains a toxic cocktail of heavy metals, hydrocarbons and drilling fluids will do no harm. We are assured that aquifers and surface water will not be contaminated by pumping fracking chemicals into the earth of which only half (by volume) will be retrieved and held in open-air ponds, until “some beneficial use” can be found.
We now see Metgasco building a new “temporary holding pond” near Casino next to a full one with dead birds floating on it at the headwaters of the Richmond River after they were caught out dumping their toxic waste water into the public sewage system.
Where will this small start-up be in a few years when the politicians finally wake up and require their mess to be cleaned up? It is an open secret that Metgasco plans to get all the necessary approvals and then sell out to one of the large foreign corporations. When the gas is gone – along with our health – who will still be around to sue for compensation?
And how will we assess the poisoning of our underground water resources? No one knows how to fix aquifer pollution. Anyone with shares in Metgasco might be smart to sell out now.
S Sledge
Lillian Rock
