The Australian Government’s push for liquefied natural gas (LNG) as a low-emissions fossil fuel has been exposed with a new report finding no evidence LNG  is any ‘cleaner’ than coal.

The Conservation Council of Western Australia’s Clean State report states an international review of LNG infrastructure found the threat to the climate from LNG is ‘as large or larger than coal’ when levels of methane emissions are included.

The Australian Government has rejected key recommendations of the Senate Inquiry into the governance and operation of the Northern Australian Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) aimed at improving transparency and avoiding conflicts of interest.

Greens Co-deputy leader and Senator for Queensland Larissa Waters said the Morrison Government had rejected the evidence in favour of continuing with a politically motived waste of taxpayers’ money designed to funnel community resources into projects like Adani.

Australian Greens climate change and energy spokesperson, Adam Bandt, responded today to the push from Federal Energy Minister, Angus Taylor, for Victoria to lift its onshore gas moratorium, saying more gas won’t fix Australia’s energy problems and will make climate change worse.
 
“While renewables are pulling electricity costs down, gas is driving costs up,”  said Mr Bandt.
 
“Lifting the fracking ban in Victoria will just see more gas sold offshore to the highest bidder while making global warming worse.”
 

The Greens will move to protect Australia’s precious groundwater by extending the ‘water trigger’ to all types of unconventional gas mining as part of the their plan to ban fracking across Australia, mining and resources spokesperson Larissa Waters will announce today.

Greens Treasury spokesperson welcomes the announcement of a government review into potential rorting of the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax and the Commonwealth Royalty regime. Yesterday in Senate question time we asked the Government to consider doing this.

Senator Whish-Wilson said, “The Government has known about potential rorting by big fossil fuel companies of the PRRT and the oil and gas royalty regimes for years. Everyone should pay their fair share.

“The Greens have been raising questions about the integrity of these schemes in the last parliament and in this one.