Blog | 16th Nov, 2020

Save Westernport update: More dirty tricks from AGL!

AGL have been trying to hide the fact that their gas proposal could cause 17 times more climate pollution than what they originally claimed!
By Victor Komarovsky Community Organiser
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Hearings are underway to assess the environmental impacts of AGL’s dirty gas proposal through the Environmental Effects Statement (EES) process (you can follow the progress here). And working alongside Save Westernport, Victorian National Parks Association and Environmental Justice Australia, we have exposed more dirty tricks from AGL.

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Independent experts confirmed that AGL have been grossly underreporting the greenhouse gas emissions of the gas they import by leaving out important sources of emissions.

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AGL had two years to collect evidence to try and justify putting a damaging fossil fuel project in the middle of one of Victoria’s most precious ecosystems. Now they’ve had four weeks of public hearings with AGL’s experts trying to convince the EES Panel to recommend in favour of their polluting plans.

But it is becoming increasingly clear AGL has downplayed the potential impacts of their gas import terminal on our climate, the local environment, cultural heritage and the Westernport Bay community.

Thanks to an expert witness appearing on behalf of the Mornington Peninsula and Bass Coast councils, we learnt more about one of AGL’s most brazen greenwashing efforts.

This expert showed that AGL underreported the overall (Scope 3) emissions of the project by more than 17 times, by deliberately leaving out emissions from liquefying the gas and from its consumption.

Together with other submitters such as local councils, we have called them out on this fact. As a result, AGL was forced to commission a new report on which confirmed our concerns.

But that’s not all. Over the past four weeks opponents of AGL’s polluting plan have been gathering more examples on the poor quality of AGL’s reports and the damage their gas terminal would do:

  • AGL’s gas terminal would discharge chlorine at levels 5 times higher than those of an alternative gas import terminal proposed for Port Kembla in NSW
  • AGL downplayed the potential impacts chlorinated water on the Westernport Bay environment
  • AGL haven’t even completed essential cultural heritage impact assessments, which has been exposed by the Bunurong Land Council’s hard-hitting submission

AGL’s plan is to lock us in to dirty gas for at least 20 more years, blowing our climate efforts out of the water. Victoria can and must do better than giving the green light to potentially destructive projects like this one.

AGL’s plans are bad for Westernport Bay, for its community and for the wonderful wildlife that call that the Bay home.

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