The Queensland Greens are concerned that the Department of Environment and Resource Management is understating the significance of the muddiness and aluminium concentrations in Gladstone waters and sediment in its report released last Friday.
[See http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/gladstone/pdf/port-curtis-3rd-update-report.pdf]
The report of the 'Third Update on the Water Quality of Port Curtis and Tributaries' emphasises that while high levels of dissolved aluminium were detected at several sites across the harbour from September to December 2011, these high levels have been detected in previous studies.
"The Gladstone Fish Health Scientific Advisory Panel recommended testing for total and dissolved aluminium, Queensland Greens spokesperson Libby Connors said today.
"Unfortunately DERM's monitoring does not report total aluminium, although they are likely to be testing for it. Furthermore its current testing can only detect dissolved aluminium at twenty times the Australian and New Zealand Trigger Value of 0.5 µg/L.
"We have to assume that all sites are therefore above the trigger level.
"The potential for acute toxic effects of aluminium in the gills of barramundi from both dissolved aluminium in the water and total aluminium attached to the sediment stuck in their gills is significant."
Greens spokesperson Libby Connors said that advice from environmental medicine specialist, Dr Andrew Jeremijenko, is that where turbidity is high, total aluminium is likely to be high. According to Dr Jeremijenko, "DERM has previously found that total aluminium is often closely associated with the amount of sediment in the water and there is a strong relationship between total aluminium and turbidity at the sites.
"So there is certainly a problem if they are using tests that cannot determine whether the level is harmful or not."
DERM have been reassuring Gladstone Harbour users that all is well when in fact their monitoring has not been detailed or minute enough to meet ANZ environmental health triggers.
"This is a repeat of the farcical nature of air quality monitoring near coal mines and coal dumps, Greens spokesperson Libby Connors said.
"Environmental health experts have warned that the most damaging coal dust particulates for human respiratory disease are the ultra-fine particles known as PM2.5 and PM1 which are so minute that they can enter the blood stream.
"It was reported in national news on Saturday that Queensland's Safety in Mines Testing and Research officers are monitoring air quality near Oakey on the Darling Downs only for fine particles of PM10, which are much larger, so that the real threat to human health remains undetected.
"So we have two state government agencies that are not doing sufficiently detailed checks on harmful environmental activities, yet have the audacity to keep telling the Queensland public that they can find no evidence of any environmental problems.
"The Queensland Greens repeat, the state government does not have the capacity to regulate these big coal and gas industries sufficiently and the companies will not pay for proper environmental controls.
"They have no commitment to Queenslanders' public or environmental health.
When the coal and gas are finished they will withdraw to their board rooms in Beijing and London and Queensland will be left with the public
health and land degradation bill.
"It is time there was a pause on these developments so we can have proper consideration of where in the state it is safe for these two sectors to
proceed and where we need to exclude them."
Contact: Libby Connors 0429 487 110; Dr Andrew Jeremijenko 0438 372 653
Libby Connors is Queensland Greens state spokesperson and candidate for Yeerongpilly
Relevant links
http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/gladstone/pdf/port-curtis-3rd-update-report.pdf
http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/195_06_190911/cas10169_fm.html
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/living-in-the-dusty-shadow-of-coal-mining/story-e6frg6z6-1226255705308