Ms Rinehart get nod for coal railway project in central Queensland

Saturday, 12 Nov 2011

Mining billionaire Ms Gina Rinehart has retained the right to build a controversial coal rail corridor in central Queensland, after the state government successfully quashed a Supreme Court challenge led by QCoal.

Rinehart’s Hancock Coal won approval from the Bligh government late last year to build a AUD 2.2 billion railway from its Alpha Coal Mine in the Galilee Basin, about 360 kilometres southwest of Mackay, to the Abbot Point coal port near Bowen.

The state government declared the Alpha Coal Rail Corridor Project as an infrastructure facility of significance because it would increase the state’s overall coal production by 35% and provide employment and business opportunities.

The state also stands to gain an additional AUD 430 million in royalties each year through the project, with Australia’s annual export revenue set to receive a AUD 1 billion boost.

The declaration meant land necessary for the project could be compulsorily acquired by the state, and then leased back to Hancock Coal on a long-term basis.

However, the corridor traverses land owned by around 40 different interest holders, including at least five other mining companies.

Five companies that hold tenements or mining leases in the area challenged the legality of the government’s approval in an application to the Supreme Court lead by QCoal against Queensland Infrastructure Minister Stirling Hinchliffe, who, with the state’s Coordinator General, was responsible for the significant project declaration.

They argued in court before Justice Martin Daubney in March that the proposed railway could not possibly be deemed significant because it terminated about 20 kilometres west of the port facility at Abbot Point.

The project hit a major hurdle in September last year, when the Supreme Court repealed the state government’s significant declaration on the grounds it was mishandled.

As a result, Hancock Coal was forced to realign the rail corridor completely outside the Bowen Basin in order to gain approval again, although this raised the opportunity for other coal companies to object.

(sourced Brisbanetimes)