Output of coal to triple by 2030

Courier Mail
Thursday 10/7/2008 Page: 16

QUEENSLAND, already belching out 30 per cent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, is set to nearly triple coal production by 2030. Premier Anna Bligh said the state's commitment to coal heightened the importance of developing new technologies. Speaking yesterday at the opening of the RG Tanna coal terminal expansion at Gladstone, she said climate change made "clean" measures important for the coal industry.

"I think the public wants to play its part as they did in other cases like water use, but they also expect us to be finding alternative sources of energy, like solar," Ms Bligh said. "I think they also understand that a massive industry like the coal industry, rather than just give up and walk away from it, if we can make it clean, if we can bury the emissions... that would be a great thing for countries like Australia and we should make that effort." Ms Bligh said the industry was doing its part by investing $600 million over five years on clean coal research. From 200,000 tonnes in 1960, Queensland is expected to export 200 million tonnes of coal within the next 18 months and 370 million tonnes in 20 years.

The RG Tanna terminal expansion has increased its output from 30 million tonnes a year to between 40 and 70 million tonnes. Gladstone's role in Queensland's coal-based economy is set to grow. The Wiggins Island terminal is scheduled to ship 25 million tonnes a year by 2012 and a Curtis Island expansion is under consideration. According to a recent climate change inventory, in 2006 Queensland produced 170 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, 30 per cent of the national figure.