A proposal to burn native vegetation in NSW Redbank Power Station would supercharge land clearing

The Biodiversity Council is urging the NSW Independent Planning Commission to reject a proposal to restart NSW’s Redbank Coal Power Station by burning biomass, which would principally come from clearing native vegetation.

The expert group founded by 11 universities say the project would supercharge land clearing in western NSW while pumping as much carbon into the atmosphere as a coal-fired power station.

The scientists led group say the proposal greenwashes habitat destruction as renewable energy.

Verdant Earth Technologies proposes to restart the Redbank Power Station using up to 700,000 tonnes of dry biomass a year. One of the major sources of biomass would be from clearing shrublands classed as Invasive Native Species (INS).

The Biodiversity Council say the project should not be approved because the assumptions it is based on are false or unproven, and the harms it will cause greatly exceed any public benefit.

Lis Ashby, Biodiversity Council Policy and Innovation Lead, said:

“This project would incentivise land clearing.

"By offering payments to farmers to bulldoze this vegetation on their land and take it away, the Redbank project will encourage many more farmers to clear vegetation than are currently doing so.

“Their Redbank plan calls for 20,000 hectares of clearing in its first year alone, which is triple current legal levels.

“The NSW Department of Planning’s assessment overlooked serious flaws in the project’s climate and biodiversity impacts, including the unrealistic claim that native vegetation feedstock will be replaced by fuel crops within five years.”

Biodiversity Council member Distinguished Professor David Lindenmayer AO from the Australian National University said:

“The proposed Redbank Power Station would do enormous harm to biodiversity and undermine climate action.

“Burning native forests is not good for the climate. Native vegetation is the most important carbon sink we have. We need energy solutions that restore the environment, not destroy it.

“This project would substantially increase the amount of atmospheric carbon, because the time lag between when the vegetation biomass is burnt, and when the carbon emissions are re-fixed back in vegetation or oceans, is enormous.

“By greatly increasing vegetation clearing they are also reducing the amount of vegetation available to do the absorbing and the vegetation growth rates in those inland woodland landscapes where vegetation will come from are very slow.

“Analysis indicates that about 25 to 30% of the carbon released now will still be in the atmosphere in 2000 years' time.

“Our research found that large-scale biomass burning of native vegetation, like that proposed for the Redbank Power Station harms forest ecosystems and reduces their resilience to climate change impacts.

“Losing biodiversity while cranking up emissions is exactly the opposite of what we need to do.”

Biodiversity Council Co-Chief Councillor Professor Hugh Possingham from the University of Queensland said:

“A key source of biomass identified for the power station is the clearing of Invasive Native Species (INS).

“INS is a term for dense shrublands that some landowners find inconvenient and call unnatural, but they have always been a part of landscapes in New South Wales, although where they occur may have changed due to land management practices.

“They provide important habitat for many native animals and plants, including for threatened species.

“Farmers can self-assess shrublands as INS and clear them without any ecological or regulatory oversight under New South Wales’s weak land clearing regulations. This project would increase their clearing, harming biodiversity.”

Key Concerns:

• Not carbon neutral – Burning biomass releases significant greenhouse gases; Redbank’s modelling underestimates emissions.
• Incentivises land clearing – Project requires up to 20,000 hectares of clearing in its first year alone, triple current legal levels.
• Destroys biodiversity – Regrowth and invasive native species (INS) vegetation support threatened species and ecosystem recovery.
• Unreliable fuel assumptions – Replacing native vegetation with “purpose-grown” crops is unlikely due to high costs and poor viability.
• Weak regulation – Native vegetation can be self-assessed as invasive and cleared with minimal oversight.