Australia OKs Dumping Dredge Waste In Barrier Reef

An anonymous reader writes "Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has approved the dumping of 3 million cubic meters of dredge waste in park waters. The decision has been blasted by environmentalists. 'This is a sad day for the reef and anyone who cares about its future,' said WWF Great Barrier Reef campaigner Richard Leck. 'The World Heritage Committee will take a dim view of this decision, which is in direct contravention of one of its recommendations.'"

Comments

By reef...

[LordLucless]

And by "reef", they mean a patch of silt 25km away from the actual reef.

Re:By reef...

[mjwx]

And by "reef", they mean a patch of silt 25km away from the actual reef.

You do know that 25 KM is not a long distance, it's only 17 miles if you're not competent with metric measurements.

25 KM will easily be covered by currents.

The federal Australian government is also attempting to have the old growth forests in Tasmania de-listed as a world heritage area so they can log there.

Re:By reef...

[Anonymous Coward]

Deepwater Horizon involved oil which floats, not heavy dredging spoil which by definition does not. Sure, currents move sediment on the ocean floor around, but not much. And bear in mind that the GBR region already has any number of major rivers flowing into it which dump millions of tons of sediment into the area every year; sediment which, moreover, is full of agricultural chemicals and fertilizer. When you see a picture of the GBR it's inevitably of high grade coral surrounded by brilliant aquatic fauna. What you don't see is that 99.99% of the region is not reef, it's just normal continental shelf, an area the size of Germany (as someone else said). The occasional dredging operation or ship hitting the bottom in the GBR region are near irrelevant. They are just high profile trivialities for environmentalists to grasp and use to excite the general public. The real threats to the GBR are global warming and farm runoff.

Re:By reef...

[Harlequin80]

Why is this modded insightful?

It is being sucked up out of the shipping channel and harbour (ie off the ocean floor) and then being transport basically no distance and put back down in the main area silt builds up. Also current flows are AWAY from the reef.

This will have orders of magnitude less impact than the floods we have do.

Re:By reef...

[TapeCutter]

Clear water is essential since coral needs sunlight to survive. You won't get a tropical reef without mangroves, mangroves hold the silt in place at the river mouth and keep the reef water clear. They are so effective as a filter for fine particulate matter that they clean the filthy outflow from the Ganges and provide the crystal clear waters where some spectacular reefs can be found. These people are building the largest coal port in the world, it's a $30 billion project. This site was chosen because it was cheap and convenient, I don't think a few extra bucks to dump it in deep water off the continental shelf is too much to ask given the perceived risk to the tourist and fishing industries that rely on a healthy reef.

The silt found in the dumping area is not "already in the water", it's on the sea bed. It's only a problem to coral if someone stirs it up to the point it starts blocking sunlight.

Re:By reef...

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

As for Tasmania, almost 50% of the entire state is currently world heritage listed.

Are you sure about that? Closer to 20% it would seem.

I don't think de-listing a fraction of a percent of that ....

A fraction of a percent? They're de-listing ~74000 hectares of 1.4 million. Thats closer to 20%.

...is going to cause much damage.

You can't even get basic facts right & you expect people to believe your assessment of what will cause much damage? Even by slashdot standards, you're a fuckwit.

Re:Sign the petition

[TapeCutter]

In this specific case it's actually sand mixed with fine silt, it's clean but silt is a problem for coral, it needs clear water or it will die from insufficient sunlight. Having said that there is no coral at the dumping site, but there's plenty nearby and oceans have currents and storms that will move it around. It would have been much simpler to sail the barges a bit further out to open water off the continental shelf and dump it in the open ocean, but that would have cost a few more dollars so instead they lobby the feds to gain permission to vandalise the reef.

This new government has a vindictive ideological grudge against environmental issues, they are also planning to open up 70-something thousand hectares of world heritage forest in Tasmania to logging. Despite the fact that after decades of wrangling, loggers and environment groups agreed on a peace deal last year that included a ban on logging in that forest. Forestry is a major part of Tasmania's economy, nobody on either side of that long and arduous fight wants to reignite the divisive issue except the new federal government.

Re:Sign the petition

[weilawei]

This is what I get for not running the numbers myself: It's actually 15.5ish miles, but my point stands the same, even more so, if anything.

Re:Sign the petition

[thegarbz]

You mean the park authority headed up by these guys?

Colour me sceptical that this is such a great benefit to the reef.

Clive Palmer

[TapeCutter]

The balance of power in the senate is unclear after the recent election, but "billionaire miner" and newly minted federal Senator, Clive Palmer has collected a few oddball independent senators under his "PUP" party banner. Their oddball nature is what makes the balance uncertain, also AFAIK there is nothing in writing, it's been all press talks where Palmer did most of the talking. However, what is clear is that if the oddballs remain loyal to Palmer, then Palmer holds all the cards. In essence he will have the "umpire" vote whenever the major parties disagree.

Now here's the unsurprising news about the money trail - The project we are discussing is a joint venture between "mining magnates" Gina Reinhart, and you guessed it, Senator Clive Palmer.

I'm sure they can find somewhere suitable.

Yes, and that place is the open ocean beyond the reef or as clean landfill, but "doing the right thing" would mean Clive and Gina (world's richest woman) would have to spend the money they thought they could save by socialising the risks involved.

At the end of the day it's really quite simple, parks are not created for use as cheap landfill sites for the mining industry, why such an application would even be considered is beyond me. Worse still if the government were to reverse the decision, they will probably be sued for the extra costs and several million mugs like me will end up paying their costs anyway.