Permanent moratorium on fracking

The Tasmanian Greens Member for Lyons Tim Morris MP today committed to introducing a permanent moratorium on unconventional oil and gas drilling in Tasmania, known as ‘fracking’.

The election commitment followed alarming reports from New South Wales that a coal seam gas project operated by Santos had contaminated an aquifer with uranium at levels 20 times higher than safe drinking water guidelines.
“Tasmanians have seen the disastrous effects of fracking on prime agricultural land in other states, and they will not let it happen here.”

“There’s not much point rolling out irrigation infrastructure to farms in the Midlands if we are just going to frack it and potentially poison the water supply.”

“The Greens will amend the state Mineral Resources Development Act 1995 to prohibit the use of the hydraulic fracture stimulation process in mining operations in Tasmania, for the purposes of releasing natural gas from shale.”

“Under the current laws landowners are virtually powerless to prevent fracking from occurring on their properties, and potentially polluting underground water.”

“Labor and Liberal have ignored the legitimate concerns of hundreds of midlands landowners over the potential impacts of fracking on their land.”

“Only the Greens will give landowners and primary producers one hundred per cent certainty that their properties will not be impacted by fracking.”

“The Greens are the only party with a clear position on the public record of saying no to fracking.”

“Labor and Liberal made their true position on fracking clear last year, when they voted against a Greens motion for a moratorium,” Mr Morris said.

The Greens No Fracking Way policy ( http://tasmps.greens.org.au/sites/greens.org.au/files/u8532/.pdf/Mar08_No%20Fracking%20Way_T%20Morris%20MP.pdf ) is available for download on the Greens MPs’ website

A Greens election advertisement on fracking ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBsV1RvECs0 ) will be screening on commercial television from tonight. The TVC is available on our YouTube channel.

Tasmanian Greens Member for Lyons Tim Morris