The Tamar valley from Brady's Lookout. (All images of the Tamar valley were taken by the author and can be used without permisssion for any purpose)
This site has been set up in response to the proposal to site a kraft pulp mill at LONGREACH on the Tamar river, an area of great natural scenic beauty with a population of 100,000 people, instead of at HAMPSHIRE, an unpopulated area surrounded by vast forests. This website has NO connection with any political party or with the Wilderness Society. The site has now been following this saga for over seven years.To see a timeline of developments, click on LATEST NEWS AND UPDATES.
Protest action at the site:
WHY THE TAMAR VALLEY IS THE WORST POSSIBLE PLACE FOR A PULP MILL.**********IF YOU LIVE IN THE TAMAR VALLEY OR LAUNCESTON YOU NEED TO READ THIS SITE**********
**********IF YOU ARE A COMPANY LOOKING AT INVESTING BACK OFF - THIS PROJECT STINKS **********
**********ANTI-PULPMILL ORGANISATIONS ARE STILL IN OPERATION AND WILL VIGOROUSLY OPPOSE ANY ATTEMPT TO RESURRECT THIS PROJECT WITH DIRECT ACTION AND INTERNATIONAL MEDIA CAMPAIGNS**********
5/3/2013: GUNNS ARE LIQUIDATED 8/3/2013: COMMENT There are a host of reasons that opponents of the project
give for the project not going ahead. This site looks at many of them.
For new visitors to this site here are a few: This one shows how close it is to the residential and agricultural area Rowella:
Here is the Bell Bay industrial complex in the distance:
* THERE IS NOT ENOUGH PLANTATION WOOD IN TASMANIA TO SUPPORT
A MILL THIS SIZE At
the start of the approval process, Gunns Ltd, the State Government, all
the Liberal and Labor State MPs and the Federal Minister of the
Environment
all agreed that an independent RPDC would decide if the proposal to
build a pulpmill at Longreach was acceptable.
In January 2007 two members of the RPDC panel resigned blaming State
Government interference. One of those resignations
was pulpmill expert and scientist Dr. Warwick Raverty. Dr. Raverty has
since had this to say about the proposal:
The mandatory emission limit guidelines have been set on the basis that any pulpmill is located well away from a
population centre. Longreach is an atrocious location for a pulpmill because of the already polluted airshed
(8 people a year die prematurely because of it) and the presence of the city of Launceston close by. Bad smells
and noxious gases are also likely to be a problem. Dr. Raverty says that the RPDC wrote to Gunns Ltd on numerous
occasions asking them to move it to Hampshire but Gunns have refused as it would be slightly more expensive.
Dr. Raverty also said that only a pulpmill that was at least as clean as Stendal in Germany would be acceptable
to the RPDC.
Stendal was completed in 2004 and cost $1.7bn and it is much smaller
than Longreach, is built on a flat site with easy access to water
supply unlike Longreach which will need to built into the side of a
hill and the water piped 40kms. Mercer, the firm that built Stendal,
received a huge government subsidy. Gunns Ltd are very unlikely to be
able to afford to build a Stendal without a subsidy. And so it has
proved. Gunns pulled out of the RPDC process in March 2007 after
hearing that the RPDC said their proposal had serious flaws (a fact
kept secret from the public and Parliament) and a fast-track assessment
put in place by the State Government. The new assessment process was
been watered down so much as to be virtually meaningless. The
consultant was allowed 5 weeks to assess this huge project. It does not
have to abide by the guidelines anymore. All public input past, present
and future has been removed. All legal avenues to take action have been
blocked in Tasmania. The State Government rort of this whole process is
so breathtakingly blatant that you wonder how they can possibly get
away with it. The RPDC were going to
write to Gunns to tell them their latest information was defective and
the State
Government stopped them so interfering in a lawful process. Gunns,
having been told
that their latest information was going to be rejected, withdrew from
the process and was rewarded with a lesser assessment. What's more the
Premier kept the fact secret
and Parliament discussed and voted on it without full disclosure of
information! Then, even after this information had been revealed,
Liberal and Labor MPs voted the bill
through so breaking their election promises. The SWECO assessment has turned
out to be invalid as it clearly states on page 16 that it makes the
assumption
that 'the limits are appropriate for protecting the receiving
environment and were not required to be reviewed'.
But the limits were reviewed by the RPDC as the original 2004
guidelines were written on the assumption that
the mill would be built in a remote location not in a valley where
100,000 people live. But on the same page it states that the guidelines
used were the
2004 guidelines not the updated RPDC project scope guidelines - so the
whole assessment is INVALID. Nevertheless, the State Government are
treating it as if it is the holy grail! The ITS Global report has used data that is 6 years old from the 2001 census to justify the mill
construction. The latest 2006 census shows a very different position with low unemployment, population growing
and a looming shortage of labour. The ITS Global report is therefore INVALID as well.
Creditors voted to liquidate Gunns this morning. Gunns are no more. In theory the pulp mill site and permits can still be sold
but there are various obstacles to overcome not least of which is that there are far more profitable places to build a pulpmill.
The liquidators say that some companies might be interested in the (probably expired) pulpmill permits if the wood supply situation can
be clarified. The problem here is all the different companies, schemes and entities Gunns have dreamed up over the years to
persuade investors to grow pulpwood. Most of it is not FSC and a lot of it isn't being maintained and will be useless. And even
if this was sorted out, who is going to pay to run the operation with so little money to be made? Those in the know say that there
isn't enough supply in Tasmania to keep a giant pulpmill going for anything like the expected life of the project.
* TASMANIANS DO NOT WANT IT.
Poll after poll has shown this project is just not wanted
either in Tasmania or the mainland. When first proposed, former Gunns CEO John
Gay said we had
to want it. In spite of a multi-million dollar publicity campaign, the
last poll said
that 73% of Tasmanians did not want the State Government to help Gunns
any more. A recent MLC election resulted in the pro-mill incumbent
being re-elected but with a much reduced primary vote. It is virtually
unknown for an incumbent MLC to lose in Tasmania and electoral rules
prevent any others campaigning other than the candidates. The winner
said the pulp mill was not an issue. Nevertheless, mill supporters,
rather pathetically, said this proved
that the majority supported the mill. It is a case of clutching at
straws as all
opinion polls have demonstrated support falling with time. It is almost
certain that
the proponents have been polling but the results have never been
released - not
difficult to work out why!
* PULP MILLS SMELL.
Some in Canada
can be detected 100kms away yet Gunns are
proposing to build in a valley with an inversion layer that keeps the
air from circulating. At the head of the valley is the city of
Launceston.
* PULP MILL AND THE VARIOUS TYPES OF TRANSPORT INVOLVED ARE NOISY.
yet this mill will be built just over the river from the
residental areas of Rowella and Kayena. The proponents claim that the mill will is to
be built in an industrial area. In fact it is 6kms up the river from the Bell Bay
industrial complex. Photographs from the air prove the point.
This photo shows the site of the proposed mill. Industrial area?
Gunns have now said that the mill will be plantation-fed
only but sceptics doubt they will have enough wood available at a reasonable economic cost.
* THE MILL WILL USE HUGE AMOUNTS OF PRECIOUS FRESH WATER.
* THE MILL WILL DUMP HUGE AMOUNTS OF EFFLUENT
into a shallow sea that has limited
flushing action and contains important fisheries. The Herzfeld report from the CSIRO (which Gunns tried to suppress) says that Tasmanian permits
would be breached on a daily basis along the coastline. Gunns claim the results are
not valid as the basis for the study was the Baltic Sea (which is a shallow sea
with very little flushing - just like Bass Strait in fact).
* The combination of logging trucks, visual degradation and smell will deter tourists
and affect businesses like wineries, restaurants and other tourist ventures.
And now, it has been revealed by leaked emails, Gunns fiddled the assessment of the two sites, Longreach and Hampshire, to make sure that Longreach was chosen.
TASMANIA'S STUNNING TAMAR VALLEY - click here for picture tour
CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT EXISTING PULP MILLS LOOK LIKEThe aim of this site is to provide a one stop guide to all the issues. Is it really World's best practice? Will it smell badly and, if so, how far will it spread? What effect will it have on the air quality in the valley? How will it affect log truck movements? What about the effects of the effluent on Bass Strait and the Tamar river? Find out about the water supply to the mill. Will it produce more fogs and smogs? Will the noise from the mill during construction and operation affect residents and will the visual aspect of the mill put off tourists? What about possible health effects of the mill? Is the logging sustainable and will it result in loss of wildlife? Is there a danger from accidents at the mill? Is the decision to build it at Longreach justified and finally, is it a good financial deal for Gunns Ltd and the Tasmanian people? Or you can go straight to the final verdict for a brief summary of all the points discussed.
Moriarty Reach on the Tamar - the mill will be built just round the corner.
This site incorporates the RPDC FINAL PROJECT SCOPE, NTD study tour, Integrated Impact Statement (IIS), peer reviews commissioned by the RPDC and various submissions to the RPDC.
The Tamar Estuary as viewed from Kayena - this is Devil's Elbow.
We shall be looking at and commenting on the issues and what Gunns Ltd and CEO John Gay have said (or haven't said) in their promotional material on the mill, in the media and their proposals to the RPDC and the Federal Government. Also what the RPDC say in their guidelines and what the pulp mill taskforce says. Relevant links and newspaper articles are included and updated as they appear. All the information on this site is accurate as far as the author has been able to ascertain but the comments represent the views of the author only. You can check out the Gunns Ltd and anti-pulpmill Tasmanian Times websites at the links below:
Gunns official pulp mill website
Tasmanian Times Internet Newspaper
TAP (Tasmanians Against the Pulpmill) have a website:
'Tasmanians against the pulpmill' website
If you interested in following developments in this debate then the Hobart Mercury gives excellent coverage and you can check the Tasmanian news every day on the following link:
Hobart Mercury state newsGunns Ltd Integrated Impact Statement (IIS) was released on 14/7/2006 (about a year after it was originally promised). It is 7500 pages long! The mill will take 26 months to construct. Information in the IIS, comments on it and further news/developments appears on this site in this bold brown format to make it easy to locate. The RPDC have commissioned several independent peer reviews of the IIS and these have highlighted that there are some very serious issues that need to be more fully explained by Gunns.
Letters to this website - please write with your views
The author would like to thank the many people who have written to this site expressing support and also those that either pointed out errors or sent in material to place on the site or help in its maintainance. This topic is obviously something that a lot of people feel strongly about.
This map shows where the mill is to be built - note the close proximity of local residents.
THE ISSUES
According to opponents of the mill, the following issues need to be addressed. They say..................
* We were promised World's best practice but what is proposed
falls well short
* It will create a rotten egg stink right up the Tamar valley
affecting tourism
* It will add to air pollution in the valley already at times
the worst in Australia
* It will double the number of log trucks in the north
* It will take an unsustainable amount of water out of an area that can ill afford to lose it
* It will increase fogs and smogs in the Tamar valley
* There will be increased noise pollution especially during construction
* It will be an eyesore that will ruin the valley and put tourists off visiting
* It will result in increased illness and deaths in the area
* Working at the pulp mill will entail health risks
* In the event of an industrial accident local residents and/or the Tamar River would suffer
* The mill should be built at Hampshire where most of these problems will not occur
* The mill will be risky financial venture and may turn out to be an expensive white elephant
GUNNS LTD SAY THAT THESE EMOTIVE CLAIMS ARE INCORRECT
Pulp mills are very necessary. Without them we would have no paper. It makes economic sense to have a pulp mill in Tasmania because we export a lot of wood chips. If we can process these into wood pulp we can sell it at a much higher price and reduce the amount that Australia imports from abroad. A pulp mill will provide 292 permanent skilled jobs (77 salaried, 215 paid by the hour) and other economic benefits for Tasmania. However, the Northern Tasmanian Development Group study tour in March 2006 found there were no new businesses that could claim to have sprung up as a result of the new pulp mill in Stendal, Germany and a calculation by Jose Koopmans at Veracel, Brazil, questioned whether there was any net gain of jobs at all.
There are various types of pulp mill but 75% of the World's mills are elemental chlorine-free Kraft mills using Chlorine dioxide. The technology is improving all the time. All mills built now are ECF or totally chlorine free (TCF). Some are closed loop which means that there is no liquid effluent, just some treated water which can be used for irrigation - these closed loop millsalso require much less water to run but create more solid waste.
You can have a look at the issues as listed in the questions above or just click below:
TASMANIA'S STUNNING TAMAR VALLEY - click here for pictures and information
Interesting factual letters will be displayed on the site. Please indicate if you do not wish your letter to appear.
LETTERS SENT TO THIS SITE:
Information on Chlorine Dioxide Cl2O2
Chlorine dioxide is a highly poisonous, unstable, heavier than air gas that
is yellow in
appearence. It is too unstable to transport so is manufactured on site. A
concentration of more than 9% can result in an explosion.
It is used as the main bleaching agent in the pulp mill. Exposure may well
be fatal. If
an accident resulted in an escape the gas would flow down onto the Tamar and
on
contact with water turn into hydrochloric acid. A major fish kill would result.
Chlorine dioxide is too unstable to hang around for long in the environment
but
unfortunately some of the compounds produced when it reacts do - they are called
dioxins. During the bleaching process, chlorates are produced which can harm marine plants.
If dioxins accumulate in the food chain in even small concentrations then
cancers and
birth defects may result.
Any dioxins produced by this mill will be discharged into Bass Strait about
8kms
from the mouth of the Tamar.
