Australian Marine Conservation Society

$40,000 | May 2023

What do the Australian Marine Conservation Society do?

Australian Marine Conservation Society are the guardians and voice for marine life. They connect people, science, and action to protect Australia’s extraordinary oceans. AMCS achieves change by building and mobilising widespread support from the Australian community for practical and science-based solutions to the big problems facing Australia’s oceans. By doing this, our governments, industries, and ocean stakeholders will implement lasting changes to safeguard the future of our oceans, because they understand these are widely supported and necessary for the health of our environment, society, and economy.

Why is this work important?

Australia remains one of the world’s most active offshore oil and gas provinces. Despite the globally acknowledged climate crisis, oil and gas companies are aggressively expanding. The industry and its promoters are relying on debunked claims that gas is transition fuel. Little consideration is given to the fact that if these methane intensive projects come online, they will exacerbate climate pollution - prolonging the fossil fuel age.

Despite the influence of the fossil fuel lobby, the political landscape is shifting against new oil and gas, within our target areas, this presents an opportunity for change. There is growing community concern about the impacts of offshore oil and gas on our oceans, as demonstrated by the opposition to the PEP-11 gas proposal offshore of NSW. The next round of annual offshore petroleum releases will be announced in October 2023, with subsequent exploration activities able to be approved beyond that. Our experience proves early intervention increases chances of success, as there is traditionally less investment from oil and gas companies at the proposal phase, with less political investment. Meaning there is more scope to challenge these proposals now, and win.

How is Groundswell supporting this work?

AMCS is working in collaboration with other aligned ENGOs, to challenge the false narrative of gas as a transition fuel. While reinforcing and extending the biodiversity case against offshore oil and gas industrialisation in, building public opposition to new offshore oil and gas. With Groundswell’s support, their strategy for 2023 is to;

• Connect with local community groups and other NGOs working to stop offshore oil and gas exploration and build a better alliance across society to stop offshore oil and gas acreage release.

• Test our audience: Understanding our audience is key to achieving protection for the oceans and demonstrating public support for science-based solutions to ocean threats. We need to thoroughly assess the attitudes of different sectors of the community to what is happening in the oceans, and make sure we’re speaking the language that is understood and drives action.

• Develop an integrated communications strategy: In a crowded and noisy space, strategic and integrated communications will be critical to the success of this campaign. So much of what happens in offshore oil and gas exploration is out of the sight of our everyday lives, far more hidden than the impacts of onshore gas fracking and drilling.

• Expose the impact of new acreage releases: With new and vast areas of the oceans released in October of every year, the media and political interest in the releases needs to be pushed, and hard. The community needs support and avenues to actively oppose these releases to protect our oceans.