The clean-up process for the pollution caused by Peabody's Metropolitan mine at Helensburgh will soon have to extend into the Royal National Park.
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The miner has been directed to take the next series of steps to clean up the pollution from coal spillage into a creek which flows into the national park's Hacking River, after the pollution was revealed to have initially been so bad it was "not possible" to see the creek bed or rocks beneath the water.
Workers have been removing sediment by hand from along the creek banks and the next phase will involve cleaning up below the surface of the water, but while Peabody and the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) have not said how far it extends into the Royal, it is at least 1200m from the source.
A Peabody spokeswoman said the cleanup had been going for two weeks.
"Visible impacts of coal sediment in in Camp Creek and the Hacking River [are] now far less apparent and Peabody is also very encouraged by independent water test results," she said.
"Teams of employees from our Metropolitan mine continue to carefully hand remove sediment from the banks above the water line in a 650m stretch of Camp Creek closest to the mine site and remediation in this area is almost completed.
"Consultation with the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service and the EPA continues prior to remediation activities being able to start in the Royal National Park, with the approval of both authorities required."
Catherine Reynolds of the Sutherland Shire Environment Centre, which alerted authorities to the continued spillage, said it had happened before.
"This event is particularly shocking, but we saw similar coal sludge pollution last year, and in 2020," she said.
"If the government and Peabody Energy are unable to prevent coal sludge pollution escaping the mine, and unable to prevent it flowing into the Royal National Park, this mine should not be allowed to operate in this location.
"This is the sort of pollution that happens in countries with no proper environmental protection regulations."