Documents obtained by The Australian Broadcasting Corporation under Freedom of Information reveal that the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) identified serious concerns with a huge marina development it later approved.

Both the Queensland and federal governments have given the go ahead to a $600 million eco-tourism resort on Great Keppel Island, the first major development within the reef in 20 years.

But in approving the development’s marina and sewage systems, the marine park authority found the proponent’s environmental impact statement was contradictory, vague and missing a substantial amount of information.

Marine park officers also warned that the impacts of the development on water quality and coral communities on nearby vulnerable reefs could not be adequately mitigated.

Just two months later however, the marine park authority approved the development – subject to conditions.

There has not been a tourism project of this scale in Queensland in a quarter of a century.

The Great Keppel Island “premier eco-luxury” resort will boast a 250-room beachfront hotel, 350 apartments, and 700 luxury villas.

The developer of the project, Tower Holdings, says the project has been designed to be “a world leader in global environmental tourism” and will produce more clean energy than it uses by using 24,000 solar panels.

The resort will also have a 250-berth marina and championship golf course designed by Greg Norman.

The former world number one golfer is an enthusiastic supporter and is quoted on the resort’s website as saying that nowhere in the world “matches the offering of this place.”

But it took Tower Holdings seven years to win official support for the resort project.

It won federal approval in March last year. But owing to environmental concerns, the then federal environment minister Tony Burke attached 96 conditions, including management plans over the resort’s impact on corals and marine species.

“The conditions I have imposed will ensure that the outstanding universal value of the Great Barrier Reef is not diminished by this development,” Mr Burke said at the time.

The Newman Government had approved the project just days earlier.

But before the company could start any work it required approval from the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, because the resort would include a marina, breakwaters, and a sewage transfer facility that would lie within the marine park.

According to the GBRMPA, the proposed marina would be just 100 metres from a coral reef that was classified as a sensitive environment.

Documents obtained by The Australian Broadcasting Corporation under freedom of information have revealed that after a long process, officers from the GBRMPA floated two options.

One was to “approve the application with strict conditioning.”

Those conditions included a limit to the amount of nitrogen that could be discharged, meaning the developer would have to treat any sewage to a higher standard.

Then there was the second option the authority could take and that was to reject the application.

That rejection would be based on the conclusion that “the information provided by the [environmental impact statement] with which to make an accurate assessment for a proposed sewage discharge pipeline and sewage irrigation scheme is often contradictory, vague or missing entirely.”

There was also concerns that “the concentration of nutrients in the sewage that the resort would discharge was too high,” and that “the water quality guidelines for nitrogen at Great Keppel Island are already exceeded and freshwater wet season plumes from the Fitzroy have resulted in coral bleaching at the island.”

“The cumulative impacts of this development on water quality and coral communities on the vulnerable fringing reefs of Great Keppel Island cannot be adequately mitigated,” the document said.

Another document warned that while the amounts of effluent expected to be generated were not significant, “the risk is potentially high.”

In one email, a GBRMPA officer poses a question: “The major difficulty will be if [Great Keppel Island] have (sic) to discharge more than the stated maximum volumes and nutrient load limits, what then? How will we deal with this situation and is the delegate willing to undertake these action when (not if) these breaches of permit conditions occur?”

The documents also warn that the developer’s environmental impact statement does not account for anticipated climate change impacts like increased rainfall, warning this underestimation could increase the frequency of sewage discharges into the marine park.

“The last thing you want to be doing is pumping effluent into the Great Barrier Reef, particularly when there are these conditions when the Marine Park Authority themselves have said, ‘We don’t know if they’re going to be strong enough to fix the problem’,” Queensland Greens Senator and environment spokeswoman Larissa Waters said.

A couple of months after these concerns were raised inside the GBRMPA, the organisation issued a permit for the development of the 250-berth marina, sewage facility, and other projects to go ahead.

It imposed conditions on the developer while highlighting that the fringing reefs at the island were among the most high value systems in the whole Great Barrier Reef.

“I’m worried that GBRMPA is coming under political pressure to approve things, even though they hold internal concerns about the damage those projects might do to the reef,” Senator Waters said.

“I think that’s wrong and I don’t think that’s GBRMPA’s fault. I think that’s the fault of the government of the day letting it be known that things must be approved for political reasons.”

The Federal Department of Environment says sewage will be treated to a tertiary level and used on the island for irrigation.

Tower Holdings says it has agreed to the conditions but has not disclosed how sewage will be treated.

Project manager Anthony Aiossa says the project went through a rigorous planning process, spanning nearly eight years.

“GBRMPA and the other various government departments have done exactly what they are supposed to do as part of an EIS process,” he said.

“They need to consider any potential for unacceptable impacts. If there were any, the project simply would not have been given the green light by both State and Federal Governments.”

Queensland’s Minister for State Development, Infrastructure and Planning, Jeff Seeney, says state approval was given by the independent Coordinator-General, after alterations were made to the EIS.

“Our approvals process is the best in the world and I stand by that and I am happy to have it compared to anything,” he said.

“We have a process that is as thorough as we can make it because we are a pro-development Government; we are about building things; we are about developing the opportunities for the next generation of Queenslanders but we are determined to do that at a world class standard.”

A spokesman for former federal environment minister Tony Burke says the additional 96 conditions imposed were designed to ensure that the “outstanding universal value of the Great Barrier Reef was not diminished by the development”.

The GBRMPA responded to questions from the ABC with the following statement:

The Great Keppel Island Resort development proposal was assessed under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC) and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Act 1975.

The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority issued two permits to GKI Resort Pty Ltd which will allow:

• construction of submerged and buried utilities pipeline for potable water, electricity and telecommunication
• construction and operation of a 250-berth marina 

Both of these permits were approved with strict conditions to help protect biodiversity, heritage and social values of the marine park. The conditions, which the proponent must meet, also address public concerns raised in the public submission process.

The concerns raised in the email dated February 4, 2013 were discussed with the applicant and relate to a proposed sewage discharge pipeline and impacts on water quality and coral communities of Great Keppel Island’s fringing reefs.

The applicant, GKI Resort Pty Ltd, advised the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority on February 15, 2013 that upon further consideration the design had been modified to no longer include a sewage discharge pipeline.

As such no permit was issued for a sewage discharge pipeline.

Any remaining risks were addressed through the strict conditions which the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority imposed on the two permits issued.

Source: www.abc.net.au