A former NSW Supreme Court judge has slammed as 'dangerous' a Bill that would abolish a long-standing provision requiring assessments of new mines to consider downstream carbon emissions.
NSW's Independent Planning Commission today refused consent for a coal mine and rejected claims by the industry and environment department that NSW's climate policy was an irrelevant consideration.
In another sign that independent environmental decision-makers favour tougher climate change conditions than their state governments, a NSW commission has imposed an export restriction on a coal project.
Project approval conditions should only be used to constrain downstream greenhouse gas emissions in exceptional circumstances, according to a top NSW bureaucrat.
Making coal mining companies responsible for carbon emissions from combustion of their coal in other countries 'may not be reasonable', according to the NSW government.
Two mining companies that argue they shouldn't have to offset greenhouse gas emissions could be ordered to only export coal from their mine to Paris Agreement signatories.