The Illawarra community plans to take action on May 29 to press their case for a moratorium on coal seam gas mining in the area.
A mass human sign to spell the words “Stop Coal Seam Gas!” is organised at 11am that day on Austinmer beach, north of Wollongong.
The organiser, Stop CSG Illawarra, is confident of a large turnout. The group’s regular organising meetings have attracted 100 or more people.
The group has letterboxed 30,000 leaflets publicising the event and outlining the dangers of coal seam gas.
Eight local neighbourhood forums have declared their support for the campaign and all of the area’s state MPs have been notified.
Residents are concerned because 15 exploration wells have been approved in the area — four of which are situated in the Sydney water catchment.
Coal seam gas drilling produces contaminated water, is a bushfire risk due to leaky wells and pipelines, and the industry has a global warming impact as bad if not worse than coal, over a 20 year period.
Community groups such as Stop CSG Illawarra are carrying out what the government should be doing: informing the community of the dangers of CSG and explaining what’s happening and where.
For more details visit http://stop-csg-illawarra.org/.