Farmers and grape growers across the Hunter will take to the streets of Sydney next month as part of a rally opposing coal seam gas exploration in the vineyards.
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Residents, farmers and grape growers from Broke, Bulga, Fordwich, Belford, Lovedale and Pokolbin will join the march to Parliament House on May 1 to put a stop to coal seam gas mining in the valley.
“If the coal seam gas exploration continues then it could change the whole of the Hunter Valley grape industry,” Broke grape grower and member of the Hunter Valley Protection Alliance Graeme Gibson said.
“The vineyards themselves are reliant on climate and soil, and if this changes the grapes will change and so will the wine, and some of the grapes here in the Hunter don’t exist anywhere else in the world.”
Mr Gibson said the alliance’s main concern is water, followed by the potential destruction of the area.
“Firstly, our concerns are water. Not only ground water and fresh water aquifers but what coal seam gas exploration will bring back up out of the ground,” he said.
“When a coal seam is fractured (known as fracking) about a million litres of water, 20 tonnes of sand and some chemicals are injected into the coal seam.
“This cracks the seam and the gas starts to flow.
“But the amount of salt extracted would be about 30 metres wide, 20 metres high and 11 kilometres long. So our concerns are that the salt will destroy vegetation for generations to come.
“There is certainly insufficient known about this. One of the least things we worry about is earthquakes being caused by the fracking, because there have been reports from America that reveals earthquakes are being caused by fracking.”
The alliance was formed six years ago and has spent $130,000 fighting to halt the coal seam gas exploration.
“We have been declared a critical industry cluster and we believe we have the government’s support on this,” Mr Gibson said.
“And I believe we are going to have a win because we are going to fight this all the way.”
Overseas, France has banned the coal seam gas industry and New York has placed a moratorium on further exploration and production until the science can be better evaluated.
n The rally – organised by NSW Farmers – will start at Martin Place and finish at Parliament House.
For more information visit www.huntervalleyprotectionalliance.com.
