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About us. Rising Tide Australia is a grassroots Newcastle group taking action against the causes of anthropogenic climate change and for equitable, just, effective, and sustainable solutions to the crisis. We are committed to the principals of Non-violent Direct Action. We are part of the global Rising Tide climate justice movement. We live in the biggest coal port in the cosmos.
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The New Coal Frontier?On the 20th and 21st September about one hundred coal mining and related companies descended on Gunnedah, to plot the massive expansion of coal mining in the Gunnedah Basin. The conference was titled “The New Coal Frontier”. Some members of Rising Tide Newcastle made the trip out to Gunnedah to More images of the protest can be found here. Visitors also took the opportunity to visit the site of the Boggabri coal mine and Leard State Forest, not far down the road from Gunnedah. Leard State Forest covers 7,512 hectares of native vegetation, which is more than 5% of all the bushland left on the heavily cleared Liverpool Plains. The forest is an exceptionally diverse and significant area, housing 239 plant species and 157 fauna species, many of them threatened with extinction. It contains significant areas of several endangered ecological communities.
For more information on Leard State Forest, go here. |
support the local community protesting the coal companies plans. As the delegates arrived for the first day of the conference, about 60 protesters were waiting outside to demonstrate our opposition. The vast majority of protesters were local farmers opposed to the destruction of aquifers and some of the most productive agricultural land in the country by coal mining. People from other areas in NSW affected by coal mining came to show their support and swap notes with the locals. People traveled from Mudgee, from Lithgow, and even from as far away as the Illawarra coal fields south of Sydney to demonstrate against the coal companies plans.
Earlier this year, an area of the forest estimated at about 2.5 by 4 kilometers was cleared for the Boggabri coal mine. There are fears that much of the rest of the forest is at threat from coal mining also, especially in view of the coal industries plans for the entire Gunnedah Basin.