Arid Lands Environment Centre

Last updated

Arid Lands Environment Centre
Founded1980
Type Non-Profit Organization
FocusEnvironmental advocacy
HeadquartersAlice Springs, Australia
Location
Key people
Adrian Tomlinson
Website https://www.alec.org.au/

Arid Lands Environment Centre (ALEC) is a member-based environmental organisation based in Alice Springs in Central Australia.

Contents

History

ALEC was started by a group of scientists, activists, lawyers and conservationists in the face of major project developments in the region. [1]

Key projects

Anti-fracking

Over the last decade, ALEC has campaigned to stop fracking in the Northern Territory in partnership with other anti-fracking community groups. It is particularly focused on the Beetaloo Basin which is estimated to increase Australia's carbon emissions by over 20%. [2]

Water protection

ALEC advocates for the protection of water and water rights in the Northern Territory. [3] It is currently focused on a proposed development project on Singleton Station. [4] In 2022, they unsuccessfully took legal action with the Central Land Council alleging Northern Territory Government approvals did not follow the Water Act. [5] [6] [7]

Buffel Grass management

ALEC is advocating for management of invasive buffel grass after record fires in the region in 2023. [8] [9]

Alice Springs Future Grid

Undertaking community engagement aspects of a virtual power plant (VPP) trial in Alice Springs involving 50 participants with solar and battery storage systems. [10]

Alice Water Smart

Running from 2013 – 2016, the $15 million program delivered with Power and Water Corporation, Northern Territory Government, Alice Springs Town Council and Tourism NT supported by the Australian Government's Water for the Future initiative. It aimed to help the town reduce its water use by 1600 million litres per year. [11]

Alice Solar City

As one of seven projects funded through the Australian Government's Solar Cities Program launched in 2004, Alice Springs was announced as a solar city in 2007. The $42 million project was designed to explore how solar power, energy efficient technologies and new approaches to electricity supply and pricing could increase the renewable update and sustainability of the town and saw the development of the Uterne solar plant. [12] The program ran until 2013. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern Territory</span> Territory of Australia

The Northern Territory is an Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory shares its borders with Western Australia to the west, South Australia to the south, and Queensland to the east. To the north, the territory looks out to the Timor Sea, the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Carpentaria, including Western New Guinea and other islands of the Indonesian archipelago.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Great Artesian Basin</span> Large Artesian aquifer in Australia

The Great Artesian Basin (GAB), located in Australia, is the largest and deepest artesian basin in the world, stretching over 1,700,000 square kilometres (660,000 sq mi), with measured water temperatures ranging from 30 to 100 °C. The basin provides the only source of fresh water through much of inland Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alice Springs</span> Town in the Northern Territory, Australia

Alice Springs is a town in the Northern Territory, Australia; the third largest settlement after Darwin and Palmerston. The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd, wife of the telegraph pioneer Sir Charles Todd. Known colloquially as "The Alice" or simply "Alice", the town is situated roughly in Australia's geographic centre. It is nearly equidistant from Adelaide and Darwin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Santos Limited</span> Australian energy company

Santos Ltd. is an Australian oil and gas exploration and production company, with its headquarters in Adelaide, South Australia. It owns liquefied natural gas (LNG), pipeline gas, and oil assets. It is the biggest supplier of natural gas in Australia, with its plants in the Cooper Basin in South Australia and South West Queensland supplying the eastern states of Australia. Its operations also extend to the seas off Western Australia and Northern Territory.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central Australia</span> Region in Australia

Central Australia, also sometimes referred to as the Red Centre, is an inexactly defined region associated with the geographic centre of Australia. In its narrowest sense it describes a region that is limited to the town of Alice Springs and its immediate surrounds including the MacDonnell Ranges. Commonly, it refers to an area up to 600 km (370 mi) from Alice Springs, in every direction. In its broadest use it can include almost any region in inland Australia that has remained relatively undeveloped, and in this sense is synonymous with the term Outback.

<i>Cenchrus ciliaris</i> Species of grass

Cenchrus ciliaris is a species of grass native to most of Africa, southern Asia, southern Iran, and the extreme south of Europe (Sicily). Other names by which this grass is known include dhaman grass, anjan grass, koluk katai and buffelgrass.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Crime in the Northern Territory</span>

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Alex Kelly is an Australian freelance artist, filmmaker and producer based in regional Australia. Kelly was born in regional NSW and grew up in a farming community near Wodonga in regional Victoria,

Beetaloo is the name of a pastoral lease that operates as a cattle station in the Northern Territory, known as Beetaloo Station. It is also the name of an area in the Sturt Plateau, known as the Beetaloo Sub-Basin or Beetaloo Basin, around 500 kilometres (310 mi) south-east of Darwin, between Mataranka to the north and Elliott to the south. This area is rich in natural gas, which can be exploited by fracking, which has caused controversy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Latz (botanist)</span> Australian agrostologist, botanist, and author

Peter Kenneth Latz is an agrostologist, botanist, ethnobotanist, and author from Central Australia. For 55 years he worked with the Eastern and Western Arrernte, Alyawarre, Anmatyerre, Pintupi/Luritja, Pitjantjatjara/Yankunytjatjara, and Warlpiri people to organise and share their cultural and scientific knowledge of central Australian plants. In many areas of Australia this knowledge has been lost, but it has been preserved in the Red Centre as a result of this lifelong collaboration. He has published articles and books on Australian plants, particularly on arid grasses and vegetation and Aboriginal plant use.

Chanston James "Chansey" Paech is an Australian politician. He is a Labor Party member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly since 2016, representing the electorate of Namatjira until 2020 and Gwoja thereafter. He is of Arrente, Arabana and Gurindji descent.

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Singleton Station is a pastoral lease in Central Australia, in the Northern Territory of Australia.

Woodgreen Station, also spelt Wood Green and also known as Atartinga, is a cattle station located in the Northern Territory of Australia, to the northeast of Alice Springs, extending approximately 2,215 km2 (855 sq mi). It was also known as (Mer) Athatheng by some of the Indigenous people in the area.

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References

  1. "About". Arid Lands Environment Centre. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  2. "The gas field so big it could knock Australia off course from our climate target". ABC News. 28 February 2020. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  3. "Environmental groups, Indigenous communities sign letter demanding NT government suspend water allocation plans". ABC News. 15 October 2022. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  4. Bergin, Julia (4 July 2023). "'Not listening': Traditional Owners ask Plibersek to hear them on water rights". Crikey. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  5. "Native title holders and environmental group launch legal action over huge NT groundwater licence". ABC News. 16 February 2022. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  6. "Largest water plan in NT history to extract 210 billion litres from environment annually". ABC News. 13 November 2023. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  7. "NT Supreme Court dismisses legal challenge over one of Australia's largest groundwater licences". ABC News. 31 January 2024. Retrieved 1 April 2024.
  8. Cox, Lisa (28 March 2023). "Environmental tragedy as fires burn through one-fifth of Northern Territory national park". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  9. "Bushfires in central Australia fuel debate about whether buffel grass or native grasses burn more intensely". ABC News. 17 November 2023. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  10. "Project Participants". Alice Springs Future Grid. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  11. "OUR WATER FUTURE: Discussion Paper: A Conversation with Territorians" (PDF). Water Resources Division, Northern Territory Government. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  12. "Alice Solar City 2008–2013" (PDF). November 2013. Retrieved 15 December 2023.
  13. Chlanda, Erwin (17 June 2013). "Alice Solar City – over to you - Alice Springs News" . Retrieved 16 December 2023.