Farmers fighting against a controversial carbon capture and storage project earmarked for construction in the Great Artesian Basin have been joined on the frontline by Hancock Agriculture, owned by Australia's richest woman, Gina Rinehart.
Hancock Agriculture chief executive Adam Giles said the Carbon Transport and Storage Corporation Pty Ltd proposal presented "unacceptable" socioeconomic risks to the agriculture industry and regional communities and that its original approval was "inexplicable" and "flawed".
The former Northern Territory chief minister made the comments in a submission, seen by ACM Agri, to a Senate Standing Committee on Environment & Communications inquiry into the implications of the $210 million pilot.
"It would be an extremely undesirable precedent to allow experimentation with the precious water resource in the GAB for what would at most be a very limited return," Mr Giles said.
CTSCo, a subsidiary of mining multinational Glencore, plans to capture and liquefy carbon dioxide from the coal-fired Millmerran power station 80 kilometres southwest of Toowoomba and store it 2.3kms underground in the precipice sandstone aquifer.
The submission said Glencore's proposal was unlike the "vast majority" of CCS projects around the world that were undertaken in depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs as opposed to fresh water sources.
Hancock Agriculture owns 12 properties across the GAB in southern Queensland, five of which are in the area covered by the precipice aquifer.
Mr Giles said the company was "broadly supportive" of CCS as a potentially valuable technology to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.
"(However), the risks of Glencore's proposal to agriculture - not just our own operations, but more broadly, including long-term water supplies and feedlot security, are unacceptable given the ... limitations of Glencore's modelling work on the effect on the aquifer," he said.
"Like many other agricultural users - and regional communities and industry - we are dependent on this water source for at least part of our water requirement, and its importance is increasingly critical as weather patterns become more uncertain."
The GAB is nationally significant to agricultural productivity, particularly in times of extended dry periods, and supports $13 billion of economic activity across Queensland, NSW, South Australia and the Northern Territory.
However, that figure is eight years out-of-date and likely understates the real current value.
Hancock is also actively pursuing the expansion of its interests in the western Surat area, which it has identified as key to alleviating drought risk in other parts of Hancock Agriculture's portfolio, which requires the use of ground water that is fit for animal consumption.
As well as growing crops as part of a portfolio approach to supply its regional feedlots which require groundwater for irrigation.
The Senate inquiry was to deliver its report on May 1 but the deadline has been pushed back to July 2, while the Queensland Labor government is scheduled to deliver an environmental impact statement on the proposed development by May 27.
Despite the high-level probes, Mr Giles said it was "inexplicable" that the federal Environment Department did not determine the initial application to be a matter of national environmental significance, and therefore a controlled action under the Environment Protection and Biosecurity Act.
"We submit that this is a flawed conclusion and in direct contradiction to the intentions expressed in the GAB strategic management plan," he said.
AgForce fears the three-year trial could be dangerous for the entire basin and has taken federal court action to try to halt the project, also arguing that it should be declared a controlled action.
Mr Giles also said Hancock had "serious concerns" regarding the adequacy of the consultation process undertaken by Glencore for the pilot project, including with existing water extraction licensees within the aquifer zone.
CTSCo has previously claimed no damage will come from its test injection of 330,000 tonnes into an aquifer that lies between two impermeable rock layers, claiming that it is isolated from other aquifers that are tapped for agricultural or human use.
However, the Hancock submission also referred to a Hancock-commissioned independent hydrologist report presented to the Queensland Department of Environment and Science in February 2023 on the draft environmental impact assessment of the project.
The report identified a number of key concerns with Glencore's EIS that Hancock believes have not been dealt with in subsequent revisions.
These include limited groundwater sampling too distant from the injection site, the assumption of high fluoride levels in the groundwater, "which is incorrectly stated as impacting upon water usage for animal consumption" and that water within the aquifer is brackish, "rather than saline as erroneously stated on numerous occasions".
"The precipice sandstone aquifer in fact yields usable water on a local and regional basis," the submission said.
"Hancock believes that CO2 sequestration at scale into depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs can be an appropriate and safe technology to mitigate the release of CO2 into the atmosphere.
"The concerns raised in the report specific to the project, and the inadequacies identified in the EIS, mean we are opposed to the project being pursued in this location or indeed in any location that would affect the precipice aquifer or the Great Artesian Basin given their regional significance and value."
The Hancock submission also pointed to Glencore being unable to meet current Queensland environment regulations applicable to the project, and had applied to the Queensland Government to change the relevant environmental regulations to potentially allow liquid CO2 to be injected into any aquifer within the state.
The GAB is the largest groundwater system in Australia and is the world's largest potable water source, and one of only four Basins in Australia that have a specific strategic management plan.
