Professor Craig Simmons appointed Chair of Federal Government expert committee
Posted on: January 30th, 2012 by Marketing and Communications
Professor Craig Simmons
Professor Craig Simmons has been appointed Chair of the interim Independent Expert Scientific Committee on coal seam gas and large coal mining, announced by Federal Environment and Water Minister Tony Burke.
Director of the National Centre for Groundwater Research and Training and Professor of Hydrogeology at Flinders University, Dr Simmons is a leading international authority in hydrogeology and is considered one of Australia’s foremost groundwater academics.
He will chair the interim committee, convened to provide independent scientific advice to the Federal Government, pending the formal establishment of the committee.
Minister Burke said the committee was part of a new science-based framework, announced by the Gillard Government in November last year with an investment of $150 million, to provide more certainty for regional communities around coal seam gas and large coal mining developments, jobs and investment and the protection of water resources.
“The interim committee will provide independent expert scientific advice to the Commonwealth in relation to projects impacting on water resources which need assessment under national environment law,” Minister Burke said.
“This independent assessment process will help build community confidence in coal seam gas and coal mining developments in sensitive areas,” he said.
The interim Independent Expert Scientific Committee has had an initial meeting which endorsed the Terms of Reference and commenced development of a work plan, he said.
Tags: coal mining, coal seam gas, groundater, Independent Expert Scientific Committee, Minister Tony Burke, National Centre for Groundwater Research and Training, Professor Craig Simmons
January 30th, 2012 at 11:54 am
How “independent” is Professor Simmons? The NCGRT (of which he is Director) is funded by the government; this Expert Scientific Committee (of which he is now Chairman)is fully funded by the government too. The government is the major beneficiary of the mining and CSG industries. Now why would Professor Simmons ‘findings’ be anything other than what the government wants him to say?? Why would he close off his gravy train? They should appoint two totally uncompromised (and recognised as absolute experts) in this field, like John Polglase or Dr Phillip Pells - who are completely independent and not government funded?? THEN we would all believe that it is a genuine investigation, and not just a “spin” and cover-up exercise to shut everyone up.
January 30th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
“This independent assessment process will help build community confidence in coal seam gas and coal mining developments in sensitive areas,” he said.
The above statement is actually biased - it does not “build confidence” in this process from the beginning.
If this is a truly “independent” committee - how can you state that “it will build community confidence” - are you so sure that your findings will be - NO ADVERSE ISSUES ARISING FROM CSG and COAL MINING DEVELOPMENTS? To date there have been considerable environmental and human health issues, both proven and unproven to date.