Report Finds Net-Zero and Ban on Coal, Gas Projects Will Cost Southwest Queensland $47 Billion

A general view of the Loy Yang power plants in Traralgon, Australia, on Aug. 17, 2022. Asanka Ratnayake/Getty Images

Australians living in the rural and regional areas of Queensland will be bearing the brunt of the net-zero agenda and green legal activism, which is putting coal and gas projects at risk of cancellation, costing up to an estimated $47 billion, according to a new paper.

It comes as Australia’s major power providers are looking to shut down coal-fired power plants due to increased pressures from the government and investors.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said in September that the state will end its dependence on coal-fired power by 2035 under a 10-year $62 billion energy plan which will see 70 percent of the state’s electricity come from renewables.

But this proposed ban is being questioned by a new report published on Dec. 15 by researchers Daniel Wild and Kevin You from the Australian think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.

The paper, “Estimating the Employments and Economic Consequences of Net-Zero and Environmental Activism in the Darling Downs“ looks into the impact of the net-zero emissions target by 2050 on the resource sector in Southwest Queensland, an area that consists of Toowoomba, Darling Downs-Maranoa and immediately adjacent areas. 

It analyses two sets of coal and gas projects in the region, with the first being those likely to be shut down under net-zero, which have gone through the federal government’s environmental approval process. The second set is resource projects that are undergoing the environmental approval process but which are at risk of being cancelled by the Environment Council of Central Queensland and its lawyers, Environmental Justice Australia.