Companies that no longer hold mining licences could still be ordered to take rehabilitation action or provide a new bond, under a bill before the Victorian Parliament.
Victorian businesses will have to completely review their compliance strategies, after the state's Legislative Council yesterday passed a bill that introduces a new duty to minimise health and environmental risks.
A court ruling has affirmed that site owners can be ordered to ensure contamination doesn't pose a risk, even if they didn't cause it and it has existed for decades.
Amcor is alleging negligence by a well-known contaminated sites consultancy, as it fights the prospect of an unexpected requirement to pay remediation costs of up to $25 million.
Instead of providing Victoria's environment department with $42 million to help remediate 12 priority sites, the Andrews government allocated only $3 million, which it then redirected, according to a new Auditor General's report.
An environmental consultancy that deliberately misclassified industrial waste as clean fill and a company that illegally stockpiled contaminated material have been fined a total of $185,000, but won't pay a thing.
EPA Victoria has recommended a management hierarchy for PFAS-contaminated materials and revealed high-level results of its PFAS testing of soils and water.