CANBERRA, 30 OCTOBER 2025 — Greenpeace has warned that the revamped laws will fall far short if critical gaps in addressing deforestation, climate impacts and excessive Ministerial discretion are not fixed.
Environment Minister Murray Watt will today table Bills for a reformed national nature law, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC). Greenpeace has urged Parliament to work together to fix major gaps in the draft legislation, and ensure they pass an environmental protection law that actually protects nature.
David Ritter, CEO at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said:
“The Albanese government was returned to power promising to fix Australia’s broken nature laws and the Bills as they stand do not deliver on that promise.
“There is long needed architecture in these Bills that, if significantly improved, could present major gains for nature–but right now it falls well short of what is needed.
“We strongly support overhauling Australia’s broken nature laws. But the Bills as tabled fail to address the two key drivers of extinction and the destruction of nature-deforestation and climate change.
“Stopping deforestation and getting real about the impact of climate damage on nature are the acid test.
“The level of discretion remaining with the Minister in applying the law, could also seriously undermine the effectiveness of any reforms, including a broad “national interest” exemption and approvals.
“Similarly, the proposal to cede key Commonwealth powers, such as overseeing the water trigger applying to coal and gas projects, to the states and territories is a bad move that should be rejected.
“Parliament must work together to fix these significant shortcomings in the Bills, to deliver an environmental protection law that actually protects nature.”
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EPBC reforms must be significantly improved to deliver for nature
Tribes navigating the U.S. lithium boom have little power to influence decisions on homelands seized from them. Governments in other countries have begun to build systems that offer stronger legal protections.
In the U.S., many Native American tribes maintain deep cultural and historical ties to ancestral lands outside of reservation boundaries. A 19th-century mining law still governs much of today’s lithium boom—and it doesn’t require the federal government to consult tribes before mining projects advance on these ancestral lands.
What the US Could Learn About Mining on Indigenous Peoples’ Ancestral Lands
More than 100 projects to mine for the metal powering the green-energy transition have been proposed in the U.S. alone.
There’s a global rush for new sources of lithium to power the green-energy transition, including a major push for mining the critical metal in the U.S. Columbia Journalism Investigations and Inside Climate News teamed up to track this development trend. Here’s how we collected and analyzed data on new lithium projects—and examined which communities may be most affected by them.
Go behind the scenes with senior editor Michael Kodas, ICN reporter Wyatt Myskow and Columbia Journalism Investigations reporter Johanna Hansel as they discuss the complicated push to build up lithium mining in the United States.
Today, just one lithium mine operates in the U.S. By 2030, at least six new projects are expected on American soil, with 13 more close behind, mostly in the dry Southwest.
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