John Cobb (Calare, National Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture and Food Security) Share this | Hansard source

The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Independent Expert Scientific Committee on Coal Seam Gas and Large Coal Mining Development) Bill 2012 establishes the Independent Expert Scientific Committee on Coal Seam Gas and Large Coal Mining Development, and its role will be to provide scientific evidence to governments on relevant coal seam gas and large coal mining projects and to commission and fund water resource assessments for priority regions.

The committee can advise on research priorities, bioregional assessments in areas of high potential impact from coal seam gas and/or large coal mining developments and provide advice to the Commonwealth environment minister on priority assessment areas. It will also be able to advise on research and bioregional assessments commissioned by the Commonwealth environment minister as a result of the committee's own advice. It will publish options for improving the consistency of research in this area and information on developing leading standards in the protection of water resources.

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