2026-10-07
The Minns Labor Government has released a new NSW Gas Statement| that continues to back new gas extraction, including the Narrabri Gas Project and exploration in western NSW, despite its own Net Zero Commission warning that NSW is off track on its climate targets and that the state must rapidly accelerate renewable energy, electrification and emissions reductions.
Greens MP and spokesperson for justice and solicitor Sue Higginson said “While the Minns Labor Government doubles down on gas as part of our energy plan, unchecked climate change will make the NSW economy $1.5 trillion smaller over the next 50 years. This compares to just $3 billion in direct public benefit from the Narrabri Pilliga Gas project,”
“Communities are already paying the cost of more extreme disasters, higher food costs, lost income and damaged homes and infrastructure. There is no economic case for fuelling more of the problem,”
“Narrabri won’t solve an immediate gas shortage, and Santos has already deprioritised the project. The new western exploration areas are unproven resources that would require years of exploration and development before they could possibly produce gas. The Government itself admits those resources still need to be tested,”
“Every dollar of investment, every public servant and every piece of political capital spent facilitating new gas extraction is capacity that should instead be directed towards getting NSW off fossil fuels faster - electrifying homes and industry, building renewable generation and storage, and removing the remaining barriers to a genuinely renewable economy,”
“Gas is not a transition fuel, it’s just another fossil fuel. New extraction locks in emissions and infrastructure for decades at precisely the point when NSW needs to be accelerating away from fossil fuels,”
“There should be no new coal or gas projects in NSW. The Government should be planning for the orderly decline of existing fossil fuel production and directing investment towards the renewable energy system that must replace it,” Ms Higginson said.