from Crikey

West Atlas spill the tip of the iceberg: WWF

Conservation director for the World Wildlife Fund Gilly Llewellyn writes:

The fire on the West Atlas oil rig platform is out and the first stage of plugging the leak is completed. But this is not the end of the story.

We need to find out what went wrong and further, improve the regulations that have allowed the untrammeled exploitation of one of the worlds last great marine wildernesses.

The north-west marine region of Australia is an extraordinarily rich area that contains one of the world's largest humpback whale nursery, is the migration pathway and home for many species and is the last bastion for many animals no longer found on mainland Australia.

In terms of the environment, this region is easily as important as the Great Barrier Reef.

Unfortunately, it sits on huge reserves of oil and gas and every year resource companies are given permission to exploit more of the region, including PTTEP Australasia.

Unbelievably, in the middle of the West Atlas oil spill, PTTEP entered into negotiations to buy a further US$35 million worth of exploration blocks off the north-west coast. The deal is subject to government approval and is expected to be finalised by the end of November.

It would be astonishing if the government even contemplated giving approval for further development without first investigating the cause of this oil spill. Surely it must determine whether the company has been following correct procedures before giving it another license to drill.

It makes sense that the government should not approve any further developments of this type by any company in such a sensitive, vulnerable and pristine tropical marine habitat until the inquiry is completed.

Time will tell whether such a common sense approach will prevail given that resources always seem to take precedence over the environment in the north-west.

The region's distance from the population centers of the east coast has allowed it to come under a sustained environmental attack that would never be permitted even close to a similar region if it existed on the east coast.

A case in point is the Gorgon plant's massive expansion on Barrow Island, which was permitted despite there being far more environmentally sound options. The LNG expansion could have been located on the mainland. But now a reef will be dredged, the nesting grounds of endangered turtles will be threatened and rare species found only on this island will come under further pressure because it is a cheaper option for the company.

Coupled with Western Australia's half century-old environmental legislation, the power of multinational resource companies, the Federal Government's desperate need to inject money back into the economy and north-west Australia's distant location the remarkable natural wonders of this region are coming under increasing pressure as resource companies scramble to access the mineral resources.

That's why there must be an inquiry into this spill that has powers similar to the Cullen inquiry into the Piper Alpha disaster in UK or the Longford Royal Commission in Australia.

Its terms of reference must extend beyond the West Atlas incident but also look at the regulations that have allowed this region to be exploited with so little care for the environment.