It's almost Christmas and Greg Hunt has given us the worst present of all. Our Environment Minister has approved Abbot Point -- a project to build one of the world's largest coal ports that could ruin our Great Barrier Reef.
Embarrassingly, Hunt's announcement comes just weeks after 195 countries in Paris, including Australia, agreed on a historic, global, legally-binding pact to fight climate change.
We haven't won this campaign yet. But it's within our grasp.
The conditions are strongly in our favour. Adani, the energy giant behind this project, hasn't secured enough loans for the project, and the global price of coal has collapsed.
The project is now in the Queensland government's hands. Annastacia Palaszczuk's government has a chance to protect the Reef, but she won't do it without heaps of pressure from the people.
Tell Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's government to dump Abbot Point!
If Abbot Point is built, millions of tonnes of precious World Heritage reef seabed will be ripped up so more coal can be shipped through the heart of the Great Barrier Reef. Dredging will take place near waters that are home to endangered sea turtles, dugongs, and snubfin dolphins. The dredge spoil will be dumped next to the sensitive Caley Valley wetlands, ruining the habitat of many rare and threatened species.
To top it all off, Greg Hunt approved Abbot Point without consideration of a "secret" port -- a port that would have to be built to berth tug boats to guide the coal ships, but this wasn't included in the Environmental Impact Statement.
To sum it all up -- this project is dodgy and needs to be stopped.
Our movement's had already had so many victories. Together, we've made big banks -- at home and abroad -- publicly commit to not funding Reef destruction. Notably, the SumOfUs community made UK bank Standard Chartered rescind its loan to Adani when tens of thousands of us signed a petition and flooded its social media channels.
Now, we need to make sure that we hit the final nail in the coffin for this project, and show the Queensland government that it's too risky -- financially and politically -- to go ahead.
Tell Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's government to dump Abbot Point!
More information:
Abbot Point coal terminal expansion given approval by Greg Hunt, The Guardian, 21 December 2015
Win for Adani as environment minister Greg Hunt approves Abbot Point coal expansion, Sydney Morning Herald, 22 December