The proposed pulp mill in Tasmania has attracted much opposition from anti-pulp mill activists, who have foretold doom and gloom should the project proceed. But they are wrong, and it is time to put the arguments into proper perspective.
Pulp mills in Australia and around the world no longer have any adverse impact on the marine environment. The adoption of Elemental Chlorine Free (ECF) technology for bleached kraft pulp mills in the early 1990s has ensured this.
In the 1980s there was concern about the environmental impact of chlorine bleaching. The chemical chlorine has now been replaced by using oxygen (known as TCF) or Chlorine Dioxide (the process known as ECF, or elemental chlorine free). Chlorine dioxide is to chlorine as water is to hydrogen.
The sea outfall is some 2.5km off the coast, and there is no commercial scallop fishing in the area. The main component of the waste water is salt, which is why the effluent has a sea outfall. It also contains minute amounts of other chemicals produced in the bleaching process. International studies show that dioxins are virtually eliminated in the ECF process. The Tasmanian pulp mill will produce in volume less than one grain of rice of dioxin per year. Worldwide, 95 per cent of all kraft pulp mills now use ECF technology and in 1995 CSIRO was able to set national guidelines for toxicity of treated pulp mill effluent at 20 pica grams per litre. A pica gram is 10 to the minus 12, and as a litre is a thousand grams this limit is 20 parts per quadrillion.
This minute level guarantees that the marine environment is not adversely affected, including commercial fish and any rare, threatened or migratory species. The fact that marine areas are not threatened by pulp mill-treated effluent is reflected in the Commonwealth determining in 2005 that the upgrade to ECF by the Victorian pulp mill at Maryvale would have no adverse impact on Bass Strait.
But the Tasmania mill received different treatment when it sought approval in 2007. It was subject to 48 conditions to safeguard key environment values, including that the volume of waste-water effluent into the marine environment must not be more than 64 megalitres a day. This is the equivalent volume to that produced by the Victorian mill and only half that of primary treated effluent pumped out at Bondi Beach each day.
The conditions also require an Environmental Impact Management Plan and hydrodynamic modelling of the effluent. If the modelling determines there may be an environmental impact, the developer must modify the operation to safeguard the environment.
It was this plan that Environment Minister Peter Garrett gave approval in principle this week. While ''satisfied with the scope of the hydrodynamic modelling set out in module L and the other content of modules L, M and N'', he held off giving final approval until the modelling was completed before commissioning. He said he felt ''as though I've done exactly the right thing that the public would require of me, and also that the environment legislation requires of me ...''
In British Columbia and France's Bordeaux region, pulp mills happily coexist in regions better known for tourism, vineyards and food. While the Tasmanian mill is sited in the Bell Bay heavy industrial estate (the home of smelters and other major factories, and is alongside two existing export woodchip mills), studies have been undertaken to ensure there is no adverse impact on these other industries or the surrounding environment. Other issues have also been fully considered such as air pollution, use of water and traffic management.
The pulp mill would not be possible without the sustainable management of our forests. The developer plans to use mainly timber from plantations as feedstock, supplemented by initial use of regrowth native forest pulp wood. No timber from old growth or high conservation wilderness forest is to be used. The protection of the forest environment is guaranteed by the Commonwealth State Community Forest Agreement.
The recent approval in principle of the pulp mill management plan will ensure the environment is protected, and is an example of sustainable development at its best, value adding a resource that is exported, creating long-term jobs and wealth for a regional area.
Dr Julian Amos is chairman of Forest Industries Association of Tasmania and Jim Adams is chief executive of Timber Communities Australia.
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