This particular court rejected the “market substitution assumption”
From the article:
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From a legal perspective, I believe there are four reasons in particular this case is so significant.
1. Rejecting an entrenched assumption A major barrier to climate change litigation in Queensland has been the “market substitution assumption”, also known as the “perfect substitution argument”. This is the assertion that a particular mine’s contribution to climate change is net zero, because if that mine doesn’t supply coal, then another will.
Kingham rejected this argument. She noted that the economic benefits of the proposed project are uncertain with long-term global demand for thermal coal set to decline. She observed that there’s a real prospect the mine might not be viable for its projected life, rebutting the market substitution assumption.
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Personally I don't think the "perfect substitution" argument is that great in the first place (since it fails to take into account what it means for more supply to be on the market).
"if that mine doesn’t supply coal, then another will." smells of assuming that demand is fixed, use is insensitive to price and that substitution can't happen.
... BUT I also don't follow the logic behind this ruling.
Population and per capita consumption have both increased for more than a century so the long term data is hard on the side of "demand relentlessly increases" (for major mineral demands and for energy supplies).
The logic here behind this ruling is that within the global thermal coal market it appears that demand is levelling and peaking, coal is on the nose, and thermal coal demand will start to fall within the decade.
That's based up such things as (say) the Standard & Poor (of SP100 fame) 2022 global coal forecast report.
What they do as finnancial players in the stock market, though, is largely orthogonal to the market reports from independent experts that they commission or purchase.
The entire S&P global mineral intelligence wing was aquired from a third party and was built up to reflect the ground truth of lease acquisition, exploration, capital development, etc in the mineral resources domain.
You should read the (excellently named) No Country for Coal Gen report, which argued in detail that closing coal power plants was the economicly efficient thing to do but that various regulations meant they'd stay open long after they became net negatives costing tens of billions.
https://carbontracker.org/reports/no-country-for-coal-gen-be...
The assumption was (rightly or wrongly) rejected on the basis that long term thermal coal demand (over the lifetime of this particular project) is projected to decline.
eg: Standard and Poor Mineral intelligence report (2022)
https://www.spglobal.com/en/research-insights/featured/speci...
For the last 10 years, coal consumption has been roughly the same. Within last couple of years relationship between China and Australia reached low points, at least on surface, as low as vague of threats of military force. Yet, China still buys coal from Australia. Even if it peaks in couple of years, there is still a long way to go and this mine can remain profitable for a while. I don’t know if you read your own links, but right at the top ot says:
Demand for thermal coal is set to decline after peaking in 2024 as coal-fueled power is increasingly replaced with renewables in Europe and the U.S.
However, transitioning away from coal is complex and slow for countries like China and India, which account for 70% of global coal demand and are facing a steep rise in power demand, with a fairly new coal fleet ensuring affordable power.
The success of meeting net zero goals for countries like China, India, and Indonesia hinges significantly on the future economic and technical feasibility of carbon capture, usage, and storage (CCUS) technology.
Nonsense.
Ignored is "did not address at all, behaved as if unaware of, etc."
Rejected is "was aware of, investigated, addressed, used documented reasoning".
You're commenting in English so do please take this onboard - there is a difference and it matters.
I'm aware of the link I posted, it shows that the major global mining companies expect a decline in thermal coal demand during the lifetime of this coal project.
Whether correct or incorrect it's an informed opinion based on data by those with skin (artual billions) in the game.
> an informed opinion based on data by those with skin in the game.
This is hilarious. Those with skin in the game actually decided to try to build a mine in Australia. S&P is analytics, they don’t take immediate risks on their analysis. Looks like you don’t understand what “skin in the game” means, I guess this English expression is actually foreign to you.
Sounds like the policy would work exactly as intended. Anything missing?
Alternative power source is only part of the equation, to use it when you need it, you need a way to store it. This is why gas, oil and coal are so convenient - it is a source and a storage and you can dial production output up and down.
They started a trade war with Australia and lost due to not being able to get adequate coal from elsewhere.