Packing for the Pilbara

Mrs Mer and I are contemplating a move to the coastal fringe of the Pilbara, up over there in North Western Australia.

There’s 300 kilometres of coast and the Ningaloo Marine Park in the Pilbara. It’s World Heritage listed – that means it’s a place on Earth considered of outstanding universal value to those sharing this planet and is to be protected into the future and beyond.

We plan to conduct our own marine health check, hang out with some turtles, dugong, and sample some of the detritus in the north west. Who knows what might turn up in the ocean from the exploitation of the abundant natural resources in that area – liquid petroleum hydrocarbons perhaps?

We might even get some work with CSIRO. They’re about to embark on their five year $12 million Pilbara Marine Conservation Partnership where they will survey the coastline, the marine parks and the areas under development for ports, oil and gas extraction and processing.

That’s it you see, alongside (and perhaps within) the World Heritage listed Ningaloo Marine Park is a big bit of infrastructure that helps Australia process its domestic and exported oil, gas and iron.

I wonder, can we knit up a balance between the conservation of marine biodiversity and the management of commercial interests?