New South Wales Premier Chris Minns said on Monday his government will legislate to let MACH Energy's Mount Pleasant mine produce 16.5 million tonnes of coal a year until 2032, bypassing a High Court decision that struck down a larger 2022 approval because planners failed to properly weigh overseas combustion emissions.
Minns framed the move as a jobs rescue: MACH Energy told the state it was preparing to sack about 400 workers before Christmas after scaling up for an expansion the courts have ruled invalid. In exchange for the higher production cap — up from the 12.5 million tonne limit under a modification approved in August — the company will sign a jobs guarantee locking in permanent staffing, ministers said.
What the court changed
The High Court dismissed MACH Energy's appeal on 7 October by a 3–2 majority, leaving the 2022 Independent Planning Commission approval for a 21 million tonne expansion void and sending the dispute back to the Land and Environment Court. The judgment turned on scope 3 emissions from coal burned abroad — a precedent community group DAMS HEG fought for after years of litigation.
Minns had earlier called the ruling "technical" and said NSW would not rush to rewrite planning law. Monday's announcement reverses that posture with a bill tailored to a single mine, to be introduced in the next parliamentary sitting fortnight.
Conditions and critics
Natural Resources Minister Courtney Houssos said the legislation will mirror scope 3 limits imposed on the recent Hunter Valley Operations approval, effectively restricting exports to countries that are Paris Agreement signatories. Environmental groups and Greens MP Sue Higginson said Labor had sided with MACH Energy over community groups and undermined independent planning.
DAMS HEG, which won the High Court case, called the one-mine bill legislative overreach and asked the government to publish the text and clarify how much coal the site has been producing under which consent since the 2022 approval collapsed. The union representing mine workers said more than 700 jobs were at stake, higher than the 400 figure cited in the government's release.
Hunter politics
The Mount Pleasant operation near Muswellbrook sits in the heart of coal-dependent Hunter Valley communities already debating the Future Jobs and Investment Bill, which passed the Legislative Council last week with amendments and returns to the lower house. Minns said he had "agonised" over the decision but argued NSW must balance climate commitments with keeping families off "the scrap heap" weeks before Christmas.
Parliament's debate will test whether a one-off statutory fix for MACH Energy becomes a template for other mines facing scope 3 challenges — or remains an isolated political bargain between a Labor premier, a court ruling and a workforce facing layoffs.