Community Impacts
The proposal adds another potentially dangerous industry within kilometres of residents
In other parts of Australia, gas terminals are located up to 3.5 kilometres from residential housing.
In October 2021, Viva was fined for "A failure to properly manage and maintain a vital piece of equipment," leading to Viva "releasing levels of chemicals in the Corio Bay well above its licence limits." Why should residents trust Viva to maintain another complicated and dangerous processing facility.
Refer to our page on Safety to read more about the potential impacts on anyone within 3.5km of the proposed facility.
What jobs are Viva offering?
We should be doing everything we can to retain secure, local jobs in Geelong and keep advanced manufacturing skills in this country.
The federal government has announced a $2.3 billion subsidy for Australia’s two remaining oil refineries, which includes Viva Energy in Geelong. This guarantees Viva’s financial security. The refinery jobs will be there for many years to come. This means Viva no longer needs to gamble on risky projects like investing millions in a gas import terminal when gas demand is stagnant or falling.
We know there are far more jobs in the rapidly growing renewable energy sector than the declining gas sector. Viva Energy should commit to making their energy hub 100% renewable and capitalising on the jobs in solar and hydrogen industries.
The skills of refinery workers are transferable to renewable industries. Geelong requires a transition plan to ensure workers in fossil fuels are given the support and training to enable them to transfer to jobs within the clean, renewable energy sector.
Will this lower my gas bill?
A Macquarie Bank report states: “We believe that any gas import terminal will not lower prices on the East Coast of Australia, and could potentially set a higher floor price.” The reason is common sense - imported gas has additional costs from being refrigerated and compressed into a liquid, shipped thousands of kilometres, and then re-heated into a gas again.
Gas is an increasingly expensive fuel, and it’s now cheaper for households to get off gas and switch to electric appliances.
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Impact on recreational fishing in Corio Bay
Hear from Geoff Wilson a renowned fishing writer about the concerns around the gas terminal proposal.
The following map shows the potential areas of the bay that will be closed prior to each of the 30-40 gas tankers a year transiting through the bay.
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Key Impacts
The LNG import terminal proposal is damaging across many areas of our environment, community and climate.
