The State Government wants to build a massive LNG processing facility at James Price Point, only 40 km north of Broome’s famous Cable Beach. If this goes ahead, it will be the largest of its kind in Australia. James Price Point, 50km north of Broome on one of the world’s most pristine coastlines, was the proposed site for the largest gas processing plant in the world. If approved, it would have opened up the floodgates to industrial development on a scale never seen before in northern Australia. To find out how the campaign successfully protected this special part of the Kimberley coast, go here.
THE PROPOSAL
Woodside Petroleum and the WA Premier wanted to turn Broome into an oil and gas town by building gas refineries on the coast at James Price Point (JPP), 50km north of Cable Beach. Woodside Petroleum has joint venture partners Shell, MIMI, Petrochina and BP in the project who were reluctant to go to the Kimberley but were forced into it by the WA Premier and Federal Minister Martin Ferguson. WA’s annual greenhouse gas emissions are around 80mtpa now; if James Price Point had gone ahead it would increase emissions by 50%. This would be an extraordinary 39 million tonnes a year of greenhouse gases – equivalent to five per cent of Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions now, or more than all of New Zealand’s total annual greenhouse gas emissions. Analysis by economic analysts JP Morgan and Citigroup showed that the main advantage of going to JPP versus existing facilities in the Pilbara is that gas processing could start 3 years quicker – but delays whittled away at this timeframe.
WHAT IT WOULD HAVE MEANT FOR THE KIMBERLEY
New gas refineries and an industrial port in the Kimberley would have led to heavy industry proliferating across one of the world’s largest intact natural areas “Just as the Pilbara was critically important to the development of WA from the ’60s, over the next 50 years the Kimberley will play a similar role… …The gas belongs to Australia, it’s in Commonwealth waters,” he says. ”The land belongs to WA and – I think the Federal Government is aligned with what I’m saying – the Browse gas will be developed in the Browse. It will not come south. It would be cheaper in a short- term sense. But in the long term, no…” Premier Colin Barnett Sydney Morning Herald, Sept 5, 2010.
Broome has a resident population of about 15,000 and around 1,500 locals joined a no-gas community rally last year. Click on this image for a short video message from Broome families who were opposed to the gas refineries. In terms of social impact, the arrival of up to 8,000 workers would have been a disaster for the local community – from pressure on housing availability and skyrocketing rents, to crowding out fishing spots and ruining the image of unspoiled coastline that is central to the Kimberley/Broome tourism brand, the impact would have been huge.
THERE WAS AN ALTERNATIVE
The joint venture partners eventually chose to investigate a floating platform to process Browse Basin gas instead of destroying the Kimberley coast. THE CAMPAIGN TO PROTECT THIS PART OF THE KIMBERLEY WAS WON BY THE LOCAL COMMUNITY WITH SUPPORT FROM ALL OVER AUSTRALIA AND BEYOND. The community choose to protect the Kimberley as one of the earth’s special places, an awe inspiring part of the world that has been compared to the Amazon and Antarctica.
James Price Point – globally significant win for the environment
In a single-sentence to the Australian Stock Exchange on Friday, April 12, 2011 Woodside and its joint venture partners announced that they would not be building gas refineries at James Price Point on the Kimberley coast. Eight years after proposing the site, 50km north of Broome on the Dampier Peninsula, and following a lengthy campaign against them, Woodside claimed that onshore refineries were not economically feasible. Had the gas refineries been built at James Price Point, they would have been the thin end of the wedge in industrialising the Kimberley. With all his threats, pleas and lobbying, the WA Premier, Colin Barnett, could not convince the Browse Joint Venturers or the Broome community that the site he had chosen was the best site for processing offshore gas. While Mr Barnett has left the door open for development at James Price Point, Woodside has made it clear they have no interest in the site.
This was a historic decision for the Kimberley. The region has been in industry’s sights for decades. In 2005 a report, Regional Minerals Programme Developing the West Kimberley’s Resources Aug 2005, was published as a mining blueprint for the region. A key element of the blueprint was a gas hub on the Kimberley coast to power mining and mineral processing industries. Mr Barnett, a previous Minister for Resources Development and Energy, said in 2010, “Just as the Pilbara was critically important to the development of WA from the ‘60s, over the next 50 years the Kimberley will play a similar role…”. This mindset, and the blueprint, set the WA Government and industry on a collision course with the community. It was like the quest to protect the Franklin River from damming 30 years earlier.
The wrong place, the wrong people, the wrong community
Mr. Barnett picked a fight with the wrong community. The campaign to protect James Price Point was driven by Broome people, an eclectic mix of black and white, workers, tradies, doctors, teachers, lawyers, artists, writers, retirees, small business owners, social workers, nurses, labourers — people from all walks of life. When residents learnt what was being proposed, they realised what they were about to lose and joined the campaign. As awareness of the plan spread, supporters from across the country mobilized. Groups of people at concerts and meetings eventually grew to 6,000 at a gathering in Melbourne, and 20,000 in Fremantle. Dozens of arrests in Broome galvanized the community; the police’s Operation Archon spent over $1 million in taxpayer funds on the James Price Point protests, and actions escalated. Woodside’s private security firms could not operate covertly in Broome; protesters saw every move, then documented and publicized it through text messages and social media.
Delaying tactics by the community included blockades (including a month at ‘Black Tank’), mass submissions and actions in the courts. These actions cost millions but shook shareholder and investor confidence. James Price Point was seen by multi-national miners as a benchmark for proposals in the Kimberley, a case study in project failure through lack of social licence. This was a multi-faceted, organic campaign, fuelled by creativity, ingenuity and a fierce sense of independence and justice. It was driven locally, with national and international support. The significance of what has happened has yet to resonate across the nation, but you can be sure it’s resonating in board rooms across Australia and overseas. When a community stands up to protect itself against a bad proposal, it can win.