MOD 2 - Workers Accommodation Facility

An agreement was reached this week by representatives of Australia and most other countries to phase down the use of fossil fuels. This should be done as rapidly as possible. The Wilpinjong mine is due to ramp down production from 2025 under its existing approvals. While workers will be needed for this continued and declining mining plus revegetation, the company has not previously needed the proposed temporary workers accommodation so it should not need it now - it is an unjustified proposal. Any future mine expansion the company might be hoping for are not a valid matter for consideration in relation to the current proposal, and should be regarded as unacceptable in view of the NSW and world phase down of coal use.

Instead of fossil fuels, Australia and other countries need to rapidly increase generation, transmission and use of renewable energy. The Wilpinjong site is in the first of the NSW Government's Renewable Energy Zones to be progressed. The surrounding region should be enabled to support growth in renewable energy generation and transmission, including construction of all the infrastructure over the next 20 or so years. There is a serious shortage of housing in the region now. What is needed is permanent housing suitable for people with a range of jobs in suitable sites, not temporary accommodation facilities practically in the middle of an open cut mine.

The Wilpinjong mine practically adjoins the village of Wollar where most of the houses are now owned by this mine's owner, Peabody Energy, but they have failed to maintain and refurbish these houses - their houses are empty and some have been demolished. This is a gross waste of housing stock and of the natural resources in these buildings (timber, etc). I understand that most villagers sold out because the noise and dust made it unpleasant, along with the change from a rural community to somewhere being so grossly altered by people in a company they had no connection to, but it could become a better place to live in future, and in the interim it could be a nicer place for mine workers to live than the proposed temporary accommodation. Wollar could and should be restored to a viable community by refurbishing the houses and enabling workers at the mine and/or in the renewables industry, etc., to live there. The company could also build new accommodation in the village. This could enable the remaining residents of the village and surrounding area to interact with some of the mine staff and start to rebuild a sense of community. It could also refurbish or build new houses close to Wollar if it owns land in suitable locations. The multinational mining company has made its profits at the expense of the local community: it should now pay for good permanent accommodation and give back to this community. As the mine operations wind down, the noise and dust reduce, the houses can be used by other people and a new community can emerge, but only if there are houses.

Building temporary worker accommodation is a gross waste of natural resources. Construction of anything out of new materials for a temporary purpose causes demand for materials and associated greenhouse gas emissions that are far less justifiable than use of materials in refurbishment or construction of permanent structures.

The planning objectives for the Wilpinjong site and the Wollar area should include
- phasing out of coal mining within the time-frames of existing approvals (preferably a sooner),
- enabling rapid increase in renewable energy infrastructure,
- revegetating mine sites and enabling them to be used for other rural and renewable energy purposes,
- enabling people to enjoy carrying out a range of other rural pursuits both on surrounding lands and through having a sense of community, re-enlivening Wollar being one part of this
- conservation of nature and cultural values in Goulburn River National Park, Munghorn Gap Nature Reserve, other public land and on private land and enable.

In relation to the first and last of these objectives, I support the proposal to exclude from the mine boundary Crown Land with biodiversity and cultural values including land that I understand to be under an Aboriginal Land Claim.

Thank you for considering this submission
Kate Boyd

The mine has a village Wollar and surroundings of houses that have been made unliveable from years of neglect and vandalism. So l believe that the mine should be told that these houses should be restored and used as homes for the workers and if they didn't want to use them they could be used to help solve the rent situation in the mid-western shire.
Thanks Bruce hughes

Peabody Energy is proposing to construct a temporary housing for their workers (SSD-6764-Mod 2).

This is problematic because:
1. There is a shortage of housing. Any housing that is constructed should be be of robust construction and be permanent so that it can benefit the community in the longer term, not just be of use to the project in the short term whilst coal is being extracted. The company, having despoiled a vast area beside Wollar Village in the form of an open-cut mine, has a social responsibility to provide long-lasting assets of a beneficial nature to the community.
2. By proposing temporary housing, the company is providing an admission that its intent is not to employ and train local workers. Too often we hear that a mining project will provide jobs - jobs maybe, but only for those willing to fly in and fly out, not for locals.
3. There is a Native Title claim underway in the immediate vicinity. By approving this modification proposal, it is showing significant disrespect to the native title applicants.
4. By proposing to build housing, the company is setting up an argument that, because it has outlayed significant sums (for housing), it should be allowed to continue to extract coal further into the future (beyond 2033), otherwise their “investment” will go to waste.
5. We cannot afford to extend the life of our coal mines. 2023, though not yet complete, is already the hottest year on record for our planet, and contributing to that is the coal Peabody is producing, coal that will be burnt in the Bayswater Power Station, or exported to be burnt overseas - in either case contributing further carbon dioxide to the thin veil of air surrounding our planet that is our atmosphere. In addition, open cut coal mines are major emitters of methane that is not being measured by conventional means. Methane is a major contributor to global warming and its leakage from open cut mines has only recently been picked up using aerial technology in planes and satellites. This leaked methane does not feature in measurements mining companies like Peabody Energy supply to government.

I therefore implore you to demonstrate responsible leadership and reject the Modification 2 proposal for temporary housing as it represents a stepping stone to further coal extraction - extraction which is destructive to the immediate Wollar community and to the wider populace.

Sincerely,

Carole Stanford

Please see attached

To the Assessors,

It astounds me that the mine wants to subject its workers to constant odor, dust including silica dust and noise. This is another unconscionable act by Peabody Wilpingjong mine. The current stone mason dust issues and deaths should be the canary in the mine.

We live in the vicinity of this mine. Even through part of a mountain range is between us, most every night during the warmer months our home is gassed out by their odors. The odor has been followed back to the mine on many occasions. You can smell the odor at the mine site most mornings and evenings. Unfortunately from our experience the mine is very good at playing the nothing to see, smell or hear game.

I raise this as you can be assured when it comes to dust, odor and noise issues within this proposed mining camp, that the miners will be forced to live in, it will not be a healthy environment. The miners will have few options available as to the lousy and unhealthy conditions they will be expected to reside in, the statistics are clear about these camps not being healthy for a family unit. Build homes not camps.

You Assessors cannot conscionably allow this to occur, subjecting their workers to such isn’t acceptable. The place is a dust bowl, come out any day when there are winds and no rain for a few days and dust will be a blowing, we have many photos of such, happy to provide these if required. Please don't pre warn the mine, which has occurred before.

I am not aware of any other coal mine in our area, and afar that has its accommodation on site and that would subject its workers to such undesirable conditions. Peabody Wilpingjong has acted unconscionably when it has come to the local community, driving people out due to their operations. Gaining a strangle hold on the local area and mining by expansion. The Wollar area had many properties which many people lived in. The mine systematically allowed these to be ransacked and fall to disrepair.

If Peabody Wilpingjong was building communities we would not be in this position and their miners would have places to live. Rather Peabody Wilpingjong destroys country and community. Please before you stamp this approval, leave your offices and have a look at this mine. It is enormous. I believe that the three mines combined are bigger than the Adani mine in QLD. Shouldn’t the mining collective be building homes, creating stronger long term communities with generational mining. This does not happen with these camps.

In Peabody’s Wilpingjong mine application on the ATTACHMENT 2 STATUTORY COMPLIANCE TABLE, Table A2-1, section 1.3
• Facilitate ecologically sustainable development by integrating relevant economic, environmental and social considerations in decision-making.
At no point in this application is the welfare of the local community been considered. If it was Peabody Wilpingjong would be building homes for their miners in the Wollar area and not FIFO camps. This would also assist with the housing issues in Mudgee and Gulgong going forward.

• Promote the sustainable management of built and cultural heritage (including Aboriginal cultural heritage).
They did achieve part of this objective by letting the already built homes go to ruin and then bulldozing them, clearly this is sustainable management of built. Build homes not camps.

We remain.

There is no justification for why a new site is needed for temporary workers accommodation

I object to a proposal for Peabody to build a workers’ camp at Wollar.
Instead, Peabody should be required to build new permanent homes in Wollar and maintain existing houses in Wollar. It is the least it can do after the damage it has caused environmentally and socially in Wollar.
Peabody has a moral obligation to replace the social fabric that it destroyed by developing its coal mine and cruelly destroying the community of Wollar.
The NSW government has a chance to compensate Wollar for the disgusting negligence of Peabody Mining. In fact, the NSW government owes Wollar this much.
Wollar was a thriving community once and it can be again. With no coal mine, people will return to the area. Many people do not want to live in a big town like Mudgee and prefer life in a small community.

Peabody Energy is the largest owner of property and houses in the Wollar district so there is no need for a workers camp. Instead Peabody should maintain the current housing stock it owns and build more houses on the vacant land it owns in Wollar. This would give some long term benefit to the community it has almost destroyed.
Wollar is the center of the renewable energy boom in the Central West with Wollar Solar Farm under construction There is a severe housing crisis in the Mudgee Region which has made it very difficult for renewable energy construction workers to find accommodation , but at the same time Peabody Energy is demolishing houses in Wollar. This is a ludicrous situation and prime example of how the market does NOT consider the social side of the equation.

Please refuse this application, citing the above reason and hopefully force Peabody to be socially responsible.

Mining companies should be building new permanent houses across the region to help solve the housing crisis and to demonstrate responsible corporate citizenship

Wollar Progress Association objects to the proposed temporary workers camp. A permanent solution to the regional housing crisis is needed.

I am objecting to the Workers Accommodation Facility proposed for the village of Wollar on the basis that as part of the project Wilpingjong coal operations plan to demolish existing dwellings in the village of Wollar. It is a well known fact that we are in a housing crisis in the state of NSW and to destroy existing houses to put in temporary accommodation for their workforce flies in the face of objective reasoning. Wilpingjong Coal Operations are the largest landholder in the local area and under their watch the once thriving community of Wollar has gone to rack and ruin with the Coal Company carrying out virtually no maintenance on dwellings and infrastructure that they own. This proposal that I am commenting on does not address the housing shortage that exists in the local area. Far from it I believe that it will exacerbate the shortage of accommodation present in the Central West.

Objections are contained in the atachment

Peabody Energy, presently the largest owner of land and houses in the Wollar district has almost destroyed the Wollar community over the period it has been operating.

Peabody’s Wilpinjong Mine is phasing down its operation in coming years.
Now, it is possible Peabody sees an opportunity to make money from either a flurry of activity int the phasing down process or from hiring out the accommodation to proponents of renewable energy projects like the Wollar Solar Farm and Orana Renewable energy transmission line project.

However, Peabody owes the Wollar community more than this.

Peabody is required to rehabilitate the land on which Wilpinjong Mine sits. In my opinion, it also has an obligation to rebuild the social fabiric of the Wollar community by building new three-bedroom homes and renovating remaining homes wihich it has failed to adequately maintain for many years.

Wollar used to be a thriving community and it can be again as it is not far from Mudgge and its surrounding communities and many workers in Mudgee prefer to live outside this large town.

We object to the workers camp proposed by Peabody on the grounds that it will further degrade the community of Wollar, not enhance it.

Objections in attached submission

I am a landowner in the Wollar district. I strongly object to Mod 2 of the Wilpinjong Extension Project that proposes a temporary worker camp on the mine site. This proposal is very different from the original workers camp approved in 2006. It is to be constructed on a reclaimed tailings dam. There has been no analysis provided about the suitability of the new site, including the disposal of effluent.
The approval proposed to be modified involves a ramp down of mining activity from 2025. This includes a decrease in workers at the mine. There is no justification for a temporary workers camp for 5 years under the current conditions of approval.
Peabody is the largest property owner in the Wollar district due to past mine expansions. Instead of maintaining houses in the condition they were acquired, Peabody has recklessly allowed them to deteriorate and be vandalized. Peabody has failed to meet condition 68 (e) to implement measures to ‘maintain and manage land and assets owned by the Applicant in Wollar Village.’
By focusing on demolishing houses in Wollar, Peabody is contributing to the housing crisis in the region. A responsible corporate citizen would look to support the community it has impacted most heavily by maintaining housing stock for future use and constructing new permanent houses on vacant blocks in Wollar Village.
Climate change impacts are already on us with increasing extreme weather events causing harder droughts, bigger floods, more intense heatwaves, stronger storm activity, and more bushfires. The transition away from fossil fuels must start now as supported at COP 28. Wollar is the center of that transition in the Central West with the Wollar Solar Farm now under construction and the proposed Central West Orana Renewable Energy Zone larger substation and transmission lines based from Wollar. Housing in Wollar Village is a critical need right now.
As the Wilpinjong Mine ramps down, there would be much greater public benefit achieved through new permanent houses in Wollar Village. Instead of investing in an unjustified temporary worker camp on the Wilpinjong Mine site, Peabody could leave a lasting legacy for the Wollar community by constructing 20 three bedroom houses in Wollar Village and restoring remaining housing stock to safe, rentable condition.

In the midst of a housing crisis, the proponent Peabody Energy (the owner of Wilpinjong Coal Mine) continues to neglect and demolish permanent housing on its land. This is unacceptable. This Modification request to build a temporary workers camp is an insult to the community they have destroyed. See attachment for details and other matters of concern.

My family and I lived near Wollar, literally at the heart of Wilpinjong, in Bungulla Homestead, itself now destroyed, from the late '80s to the the early 2000s, when the land was bought by mining companies, now fronted by Peabody. At the time, Wollar was a thriving village, with shops, services, churches, fire brigade, a village hall and a school. Since then, it has become a ghost town, and now even any remaining houses are threatened with demolition.
In the current housing shortage, although the area around the mine is nearly uninhabitable, it seems to be a crime to destroy what buildings remain, and a more responsible solution, considering that the mine is reducing production within 2 years, would be to provide new 3 bedroom houses on Peabody owned blocks in Wollar Village plus renovation of existing housing stock to provide permanent accommodation into the future and help the Wollar community rebuild its social fabric.
Of course, there is no hope for our beloved Bungulla, but restoration of Wollar village would be a lasting legacy, and would facilitate the construction of the renewable energy projects centred on this village.

Please see the attached submission.

I object to Application No SSD 6764-MOD-2, Main Project SSD 6764
MOD 2 - Workers Accommodation Facility Mid Western Region.

I object to this proposal to construct a temporary workers camp at Wilpinjong Mine by Peabody Energy because it is not needed and there is a better solution.

It is absurd to allow Peabody Energy to build a temporary workers camp while Peabody Energy is now demolishing existing houses in Wollar village and surrounding areas.
There is an acute need for permanent housing stock in rural and metropolitan areas and this will continue into the future. The NSW and federal government are looking for solutions to this problem of a lack of permanent accommodation . The Mudgee area continues to have homeless people and a need for permanent accommodation for people to own and for others to rent. Wollar is 47 km or 37 minutes drive from Mudgee so it is counter-productive to destroy permanent housing stock as Peabody Energy is now doing in Wollar and to apply for temporary camp accommodation for mine workers at Wilpinjong Mine particularly as Peabody Energy has not given any information on how this temporary camp accommodation can provide potable water or dispose effluent.

There is a renewable energy boom in the Central West of NSW and Wollar is in the centre of this area. The Central West Orana Renewal Energy Zone needs a new substation and transmission lines to be constructed. Wollar Solar Farm is already being constructed. The workers at these facilities need permanent accommodation now . There will be increasing need in the future for permanent housing stock when new industries and businesses flow from the use of available cheap renewable energy.

Peabody Energy's repeated mine extensions have resulted in people being forced from the district and making Peabody Energy the largest owner of land and housing stock in the Wollar area. A better solution to the mine workers' accommodation and NSW accommodation problems would be for Peabody to cease demolishing housing stock in Wollar and surrounds and to renovate existing housing stock and build twenty new energy efficient three bedroom homes on Peabody owned blocks of land in Wollar village.

Renewable energy is the present and the future. Peabody Energy's current approval shows that the Wilpinjong Mine will decrease production from 2025 which is another reason that I object to the proposal of building temporary camp accommodation for mine workers.

However I do support the proposal to remove Crown Land from the Wilpinjong Mine area because this land has cultural heritage and biodiversity importance and is under an Aboriginal land claim.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment .
Robyn Bird 13.12.2023

Why I oppose to SSD-6764-Mod-2 Workers Accommodation Facility. From seeing Wollar as a vibrate community to a desolated one concerns me greatly.
Peabody Energy is the largest owner of property and houses in the Wollar district; they have demolished most of the houses in the village. These homes should have been maintained from the beginning (when they brought them from people), rented out to community instead of leaving them vacant and in disrepair then demolishing them because it cost too much to maintain. Some of the houses in the village were in good condition when the mines started purchasing, people did live in them.
Peabody Energy have made an enormous profit from Wilpinjong Mine and should give back to the community it has destroyed, if they were a responsible corporate, they would leave the legacy of new permanent housing in Wollar village and stop demolishing existing houses.
New houses on Peabody owned blocks in Wollar Village plus renovation of existing housing would provide permanent accommodation into the future and help Wollar community rebuild its social structure.
Information on proposed SSD is very vague, where are they going to get water, maintain their sewage and waste, the effects of the environment by the planning and construction of this facility?
Under current approval the mine will be ramping down production and activity from 2025, leaving the area desolated with no housing for community to come back to.
Would like to see a vibrate community back in Wollar, shop/postal/service station reinstated, more members for the local Rural Fire Service, health services, the school open back up for families to come back to, in the community.