The face of the Darling Downs is changing fast, as agriculture
gives ground to mining. In many paddocks these days, you’ll find
the hard hats of the coal gas industry. I come to work every
week and there’s new people I’ve never met before we’re growing
so much. And it’s ah genuinely an industry that’s got a, it’s
got its time and its place and it’s happening now. What’s
different about Queensland’s new coal rush is it’s all about
getting the energy out of the coal without digging it up. This
is a story about using coal for gas, and two very different ways
of doing it. One is UCG, or underground coal gasification. It
burns the coal underground. The other is CSG, or coal seam gas.
It keeps the coal intact, and sucks out gas instead. There are
five CSG companies sinking thousands of wells like this across
the countryside. Arrow Energy is one of them. We do what coal
miners do themselves when they’re underground coal miners. They
have to drain the gas out of the coal ah to be able to mine it
safely. And effective