Coal Seam Gas – an unregulated, unmitigated environmental & economic disaster

Something I’ve noticed about environmental debates generally (and I’m aware that this was noted by others as far back as at least the 1950’s) is that people get somewhat excited about smoke coming out of a factory, and they get really worked up about dams especially. But nobody worries too much about groundwater pollution, soil erosion, salinity, having a house full of toxic nasties and so on. It’s as though anything goes, just as long as it doesn’t involve a tall chimney or a dam.

Trying to be objective, I don’t see a lot of logic in how the general population sees these issues. Rationally, I’d think that soil erosion, salinity, groundwater pollution etc would top the list since it’s a direct threat to food production. Next would come issues like having toxic nasties in the home etc. Worldwide experience to date is that the general public certainly doesn’t see it this way however.

I’m no Green, at least not in the traditional sense, but the constant ramping up of resource use has to stop at some point. It’s somewhat sobering to realise that of all oil (for example) ever used by man, literally two thirds of it has been used since 1980.

It puts man’s energy addiction into perspective that we’re even contemplating trashing a vast aquifer and our food supply just to generate electricity. Think about that for a while…..