The new guidelines, to be formulated by the Environment Protection Agency and the Queensland Mining Council (QMC), will focus on progressive rehabilitation, Premier Peter Beattie announced at the QMC annual lunch last week.

“Staged rehabilitation reduces the likelihood that, at the end of the mine life, operations will be sold to less reliable companies who will walk away from the site leaving the state with an environmental liability,” said Beattie.

Currently, there is no policy in Queensland which tells anyone how to determine at what stage rehabilitation is carried out. As a result, there is less progressive rehabilitation of our leases than any of us would want,” he said.

Beattie also announced the name change of the QMC, now known as the Queensland Resources Council.

The name change seeks to acknowledges the council’s representation of those who are active in the resources sector in Queensland, including explorers, developers, miners, contractors, oil and gas producers, minerals processors, or electricity companies.