Access arrangements for resources projects: anticipating the issues*

Abstract

Increased international and domestic demand for onshore Australian resources is creating a range of issues around the competing demands for access to land for the purposes of agriculture, residential use and resources development. Furthermore, global demand for gas has significantly increased during the past decade.

This has resulted in the development of Australia’s role as a soon-to-be major international supplier of LNG. On the other side of the energy equation, our growing population will begin to demand more stationary energy than our present capacity—now based predominantly on coal-fired generation—will be able to provide. In this way, a significant increase in gas-fired electricity generation is imminent for most states.

These factors—together with vast improvements in exploration and production technologies, such as fraccing—have resulted, and will continue to result in increased investment in the development of onshore coal seam gas (CSG). CSG was once considered nothing more than a waste product of coal mining.

To date, the development of onshore CSG has encountered numerous obstacles related to land access. It has been subject to complex indigenous and native title claims, the landscape of which has changed and is continuing to evolve.

More frequently, however, it has been met with significant resistance from the public, by way of media campaigns, lobbying and litigation—particularly from farmers (and other interest holders in farm land) concerned by the significant impacts development may have on the quality of their agricultural areas.

This is partly due to the deficiencies of regulatory regimes in accounting for the complexities associated with the relatively new concept of CSG development, as well in providing appropriate mechanisms to balance the interests of landholders and proponents.

In this regard, new land access laws have been effected in Queensland that account for these issues.

Industry needs to understand the present regulatory landscape, as well as which techniques are working with landholders and which are not. This understanding needs to be gained with the view of formulating strategies to efficiently and equitably deal with landholders, and to avoid unnecessary, unhelpful disputes.