MEDIA RELEASE 
11 August 2025 

At today’s Independent Planning Commission public meeting, the Nature Conservation Council of NSW (NCC), the state’s leading environmental organisation, will call out the application to restart Redbank Power Station as a biomass-fueled generation facility for what it is: a harmful distraction from our transition to a clean energy future.

 A line-up of prominent climate and environmental scientists are set to provide evidence at today’s public meeting.  

Energy company Verdant Earth Technologies plans to use the long-mothballed Redbank Power Station near Singleton to burn native vegetation to produce energy. Up to 850,000 tonnes of biomass would be burnt each year - material that will be sourced from land clearing and potentially native forests. 

“The owners of Redbank have been trying to get this old clunker of a power station back up and running for years. In 2021, the local community and Singleton Council said no, and the environment movement said no,” NCC Policy and Advocacy Director, Dr Brad Smith said.  

“They had to go back to the drawing board and returned with this: a proposal that still poses a serious threat to biodiversity, will increase carbon emissions, and could be a significant step back for the climate and environment in NSW. In 2024, more than 200 submissions to that proposal said no again, so the Redbank biomass project is with the Independent Planning Commission for decision. 

“This project is uniquely disastrous. The changing climate and out-of-control land clearing are amongst the biggest threats to nature in NSW and burning biomass at Redbank would heartily contribute to both problems.  

Just last month we learned that land clearing rates are rocketing up, while the NSW State of the Environment Report revealed that biodiversity is in steep decline.¹  

The message couldn’t be clearer; Nature in NSW is in deep trouble and if projects like this go ahead, we will not turn this alarming trajectory around. 

Quotes from NCC Policy and Advocacy Director, Dr Brad Smith 

“No matter which way you look at it – from the emissions that will pulse into our atmosphere as vegetation burns, to the impact of introducing a new market incentive to clear habitat on rural land – this project is bad news. Either Redbank’s owners don’t understand the impacts of what they are proposing, or they are acting in bad faith. 

“Redbank’s owners appear committed to building a high-maintenance, polluting power station fueled by carbon-intensive sources that are finite and require costly, environmentally damaging transport. Meanwhile, real renewables are becoming cleaner and cheaper every year.

“The spirit of intent for energy projects going forward must be for true zero emissions and to regenerate and improve habitat – this project does the opposite. 

“This project cannot go ahead, Verdant needs to admit that this power station has no place in our transformation into a clean energy state – it will result in more cleared land, harm community health, and it will emit at least 20,642 tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere each year, contributing to two of the greatest threats to biodiversity.” 

Quotes from Greg Bourne, Climate Councillor and energy expert 

"Restarting Redbank means doubling down on pollution at a time when NSW is already reeling from climate impacts – from vanishing wildlife to more extreme weather. 

The claim that burning 850,000 tonnes of biomass each year is ‘zero emissions’ relies on carbon accounting conventions, and ignores the decades it would take to reabsorb that carbon – if it’s ever reabsorbed at all. 

This project would release huge amounts of climate pollution right now, and we can’t afford to gamble on whether nature might reabsorb it decades down the line, especially when we have options to generate power that are genuinely zero-emission. These emissions are real, immediate, and dangerous. 

The NSW Government should fast-track real climate solutions, not waste time on false fixes that fuel the climate crisis." 

ENDS 

Media contact: Madeline Hayman-Reber    

E: [email protected] M: 0404 935 157 

Note: Spokespeople are available for comment on request. 

Project background 

From 10am today, the Independent Planning Commission is holding a public hearing on the proposed Restart of Redbank in Singleton. NCC, along with environmental advocates, community members and experts, is appearing to advocate for what the NSW government and planning system should be doing: taking steps toward a future in which nature is being carefully restored, and our energy system is clean.  

View the schedule of speakers here  

Watch the hearing online here

Redbank is an old 151MW coal-fired power station near Singleton which has been out of action since 2014, when it was put into care and maintenance because it could no longer be provided with its required fuel. 

In 2020, the then proponent Hunter Development Brokerage Pty Limited, now Verdant Earth Technologies, lodged an application for modification to enable the use of biomass, including native forest residues, as fuel for the station. Their proposal was rejected by Singleton Council. The proponent took the decision to the Land and Environment Court and was dismissed in 2022 because the modification application to burn biomass instead of coal tailings was not “substantially the same” as the original approved development. 

Since, Verdant have sought the Secretary’s Environmental Assessment Requirements (SEARs) for the assessment of Redbank as a new development, which were provided for the current proposal in 2023. The Environmental Impact Statement for the project was provided by Verdant to the NSW Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (DPHI) in early 2024.  

Upon DPHIE community consultation for the project, 215 objecting submissions were received by and as such the consent authority has become the Independent Planning Commission (State Significant Development projects that attract more than 50 unique objections are to be determined by the IPC). 

NCC’s submission to the DPHI assessment of the current proposed project is available here 

The referral from DPHI to IPC is available here

The current proposal has simply changed the tenure of land from which the fuel is intended to be sourced, from public forests to privately held land and “approved” development. This does not avoid the deeply problematic nature of this project for climate, ecosystems, Country and health that conservation groups have been pointing to for years.  

Key facts about the current proposal 

• Wood biomass emits up to 50% more CO2 than coal when burnt, yet carbon accounting classes it as zero carbon, as trees absorb CO2 when they grow. This carbon accounting is contested because carbon absorption through regrowing vegetation takes a much longer time to occur than the immediate impacts of combustion.² Further to this, trees cleared in the first 4 years at least of this project will not necessarily grow back, and even where they do, logged forests store less carbon than older forests. Future growth and carbon storage is lost and other emissions from soils and processing are not counted. 
• The proposal relies heavily on the clearing of “Invasive Native Species” (INS), which is poorly regulated and overseen. ‘Invasive native species’ is a term that’s been used to let farmers clear abundant native vegetation on their property with little oversight, for the purposes of increasing agricultural productivity.

The proponent projects that land clearing will provide at least 92% of the fuel in the first year of operation, and "INS” will be least 71% of that total.³ Based on information provided by Verdant, at least 20,000 hectares of “INS” will need to be cleared to provide the required fuel levels during the projects first year. 

• The project says they would establish biomass fuel crops to sustain the project long term. Verdant states: ‘in order to meet the total required biomass demand, a total planted area of 72,000 hectares would be required’ and seeks to convert grasslands to crops. The project plan specifies it will target marginal agricultural lands. It does not specify how native vegetation, like biodiverse grasslands, will be protected. Creating purpose-grown monoculture crops will contribute to the ongoing degradation of ecosystems including soils and will generate emissions.

Verdant Earth Technologies intends on “remediating” mine sites by creating single species crops to grow and coppice repeatedly for fuel. Losing the opportunity presented by nature restoration on old mine sites to this project is inconsistent with the NSW Government’s stated intention of restoring environments that have been degraded.⁴ 

• The proponent's plans for sourcing fuel assumes that 42 tonne capacity B-double trucks will take 56 trips to the power station PER DAY to haul the required biomass feedstock. That is more than one truck every half hour on average and equates to 20,238 trips per year per year.
• The initial heavy reliance on biomass resulting from land clearing is not supported by supply agreements and is uncertain at best. For example, Bana Grass is proposed to provide “over half of the total feedstock” but evidence for this capacity is not made available and the proponent “believes further assessment is necessary before it can be considered for a fuel source.”⁵
• NSW Labor's current policy platform at 3.112 recognises that burning timber and cleared vegetation for electricity is not carbon neutral and is neither clean or renewable energy, and therefore forms no part of a credible strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Labor has committed to introducing legislation prohibiting the burning of any forests and cleared vegetation for electricity.