{"id":919987,"date":"2026-10-08T00:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T00:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/919987\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T00:08:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T00:08:13","slug":"a-real-life-moment-from-the-castle-the-retired-couple-who-took-on-a-coal-giant-and-won-energy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/919987\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018A real-life moment from The Castle\u2019: the retired couple who took on a coal giant and won | Energy"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Wendy Wales and Tony Lonergan and a few of their neighbours in the New South Wales<\/a> Hunter region decided to take on the expansion of a local coalmine, people thought they were \u201ccrazy\u201d to engage in the David and Goliath battle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we started this, people thought we were crazy \u2013 a little community group taking on a billion-dollar coal company, arguing that the climate harm from burning this coal is our problem too,\u201d Wales says.<\/p>\n

The couple live on a farm adjacent to MACH Energy\u2019s Mount Pleasant coalmine in Muswellbrook. For more than four years, the retired schoolteachers, former Greens candidates and longstanding environment advocates have been fighting a proposed expansion of the coalmine through the courts, with community members from the Denman Aberdeen Muswellbrook Scone Healthy Environment Group (Dams Heg).<\/p>\n

They had a question they wanted a court to answer. Is the state government responsible for the greenhouse gas emissions from the burning of coal after it is sold and exported overseas?<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, the high court found<\/a> that it is.<\/p>\n

In a landmark 3-2 ruling, a majority of judges found the Independent Planning Commission of NSW failed to consider imposing conditions aimed at minimising these emissions \u2013 known as scope 3 emissions \u2013 to the greatest extent possible when it approved MACH Energy\u2019s coalmine expansion.<\/p>\n

The approval was ruled invalid.<\/p>\n

The case, an appeal by MACH Energy to an earlier decision by the NSW court of appeal, was the first time Australia\u2019s highest court had been asked to consider climate change.<\/p>\n

The landmark decision brings to an end a long battle for Wales and her partner, Lonergan.<\/p>\n

Wales says when the Mount Pleasant optimisation project was approved in 2022, \u201cif anyone was going to take it on, it was going to be us\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cDifferent things pointed us in this direction and we followed them,\u201d Wales says.<\/p>\n

\u2018Vindicated\u2019 \u2026 Wales speaks to the media with Lonergan (at right) and their lawyers (left). Photograph: Dan Himbrechts\/AAP<\/p>\n

When Dams Heg was established 12 years ago, it was because a small number of local professionals \u2013 including teachers, a childcare worker and a vet \u2013 had shared concerns about the health of the local environment and climate and the effects of mining.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really came down to, if not us, who, and if not now, when,\u201d Lonergan says.<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead of complaining we needed to take the opportunity to challenge this project.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the initial proceedings brought by the community group in the NSW land and environment court, the ruling was in favour of MACH Energy.<\/p>\n

Last year, Dams Heg was successful on appeal in the NSW court of appeal, which found the planning commission was required and failed to consider the impacts of all emissions associated with the project on the local environment, including from the exported emissions.<\/p>\n

MACH Energy challenged this decision in the high court.<\/p>\n

Wednesday\u2019s judgment also found the approval was invalid but on a different basis to the court of appeal, with a majority of judges ruling the planning commission did not consider whether scope 3 emissions could be mitigated.<\/p>\n

MACH Energy\u2019s project would have doubled the mine\u2019s coal output to 21m tonnes a year until 2048 and 98% of the projected emissions were scope 3 emissions.<\/p>\n

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\u2018This is a very significant judgment\u2019 \u2026 lawyer Elaine Johnson with Wales after their win in the high court. Photograph: Dan Himbrechts\/AAP<\/p>\n

Elaine Johnson, the director of Johnson Legal, which represented Dams Heg, says the decision confirms that Australian governments need to take responsibility for emissions generated by coal exports.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe court has said that when considering coalmine expansions, our planning authorities must consider how to limit emissions generated from coal burned overseas,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven that Australia is the second largest exporter of coal in the world, this is a very significant judgment. Courts and communities around the world will be looking to what our highest court has said about our responsibilities to reduce emissions from our exports.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Climate Council CEO, Amanda McKenzie, likens the win to the storyline from the classic Australian movie The Castle.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a real-life moment from the film The Castle. A community group from the Upper Hunter took on a coal giant, went all the way to the high court, and won,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Supporters of the Denman Aberdeen Muswellbrook Scone Healthy Environment Group (Dams Heg) celebrate the high court ruling. Photograph: Dan Himbrechts\/AAP<\/p>\n

The NSW Greens climate change spokesperson, environmental lawyer Sue Higginson, says the high court has \u201cexposed the New South Wales coal approval process for the sham it is, and declared that new coal cannot be approved when 98% of the climate pollution are ignored\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat an incredible moment in time, that two retired school teachers who have lived and breathed big coal in the Hunter Valley<\/a> for years and years, Wendy Wales and Tony Lonergan have won the day,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are climate heroes and thanks to their incredible advocacy the Hunter community will be spared from the horrific impacts of this proposal.\u201d<\/p>\n

She says the decision could also lead to significant legal difficulty for the recently approved Hunter Valley Operations extension \u2013 the largest coal project in NSW.<\/p>\n

Wales says the community group feels \u201cvindicated\u201d by the court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re still a bit disbelieving. But the journey of a thousand miles really begins with the first step,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hardest thing is to overcome your inertia, your self-doubt, your fears, to say there\u2019s a moral compunction here.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know it and we can\u2019t turn away from it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Wendy Wales and Tony Lonergan and a few of their neighbours in the New South Wales Hunter…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":919988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-919987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=919987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/919988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=919987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=919987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=919987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}