Help Protect the Pilliga

The Pilliga Forest, Australia's largest remaining temperate woodland, is at risk of becoming a giant gas field. We need to protect this culturally significant, biodiverse landscape from fossil fuel exploitation.

Send a letter to the Premier of New South Wales, calling on the State Government to stop the Narrabri Gas Project and protect this irreplaceable forest for good.

The Issue

The Pilliga Forest is a lifeline; a connection to Gomeroi cultural values, the health of the community, that feeds the trees that provide shade, the habitat that sustains the biodiversity of this forest, and the soils that provide a fertile future for our farmers. But fossil fuel giant Santos wants to flood the community with poison for their own profit, and the politicians in their pockets are staying silent, selling out the community to a destructive, polluting & greedy corporation.

United, we have the power to protect this lifeline and protect the Pilliga forest. Together, we can ensure a clean, renewable, and healthy future that benefits us, the community, and future generations.

Gas pads and infrastructure in the Pilliga Forest, after bushfires in December 2023, threatened Santos’ Narrabri Gas Project. Images courtesy of North West Protection Advocacy.

What's At Risk

This vast forest might seem like any other, but it's a multilayered ecosystem that sustains incredible biodiversity, millennia of Indigenous culture, and powers one of the largest underground freshwater sources in the world.

The Pilliga Forest covers an astounding 500,000 hectares. Image courtesy of Calumn Hockey

Gomeroi Culture & Connection to Country

For thousands of years, this forest has provided Gomeroi people with food, water, shelter and culture. Traditional Custodians are now fighting to access and protect their sacred lands and maintain their longstanding connection to Gomeroi Country.

Habitat & Biodiversity

The Pilliga forest covers an astounding 500,000 hectares, and its rare intact temperate eucalypt woodland provides critical habitat for over 900 species of plants and 100 animals, including critically endangered species.

The Great Artesian Basin

The Great Artesian Basin (GAB) is a deep, subterranean freshwater system covering 22% of Australia's landmass and providing water to thousands of inland communities. The Pilliga Forest is a key recharge zone, where rainfall filters through the Pilliga Sandstone, recharging the aquifer and maintaining the balance for this enormous, natural hydrology system. Interrupting this system through coal seam gas mining will cause long-term water loss from the connected aquifers and put this vital groundwater at risk of contamination.

Future Damage

Coal Seam Gas mining is dredging up fossil gas from kilometres below the surface, fracturing a landscape and dredging up toxic chemicals. Eventually, this gas will be burned, polluting the air with dangerous, dirty fossil methane gas.

The science is clear: fossil fuels are the cause of the climate crisis, and all new fossil fuel projects are incompatible with a liveable future - we cannot afford the climate-wrecking impact that new gas fields will have on our planet. We must stop digging up gas and implement a plan to phase out fossil fuel mining, investing in renewables instead.

What’s being done to stop this?

Across Australia, Traditional Custodians, campaigners and communities are coming together to celebrate and protect the Pilliga forest. People of all ages, from across the country, are coming together to use their collective voice to say no to Santos and yes to conserving the forest for its inherent, irreplaceable value. Our friends at For Wild Places host 'The Pilliga Ultra', a grassroots celebration of the Pilliga Forest that brings together outdoors people from across the continent to explore and help protect Gomeroi Country. We strongly support For Wild Places and join them in opposing Santos' Narrabri Gas Project, and the expansion of coal seam gas mining as a whole. Alongside other advocacy groups, including Lock the Gate and North West Protection Advocacy, For Wild Places is calling on the NSW Planning Minister to revoke the approval of the Narrabri Gas Project, as it will pose unacceptable Climate risk fuelled by gas expansion.

People come together at the 2025 Pilliga Ultra event to spell NO GAS, in opposition to Santos’ Narrabri Gas Project. Image courtesy of Lock the Gate

Australia is currently one of the world's largest exporters of gas, and its role as a 'transition' fuel is rapidly declining. This new fossil fuel project is not necessary and must be stopped in its tracks. If operational, the Narrabri Gas Project will create 1.25million tonnes of new carbon emissions annually (Scope 1 & 2) plus an additional 3.8million tonnes per annum once the gas is burnt (Scope 3)
Please add your voice to the growing movement of people urging the NSW Government to respect Gomeroi country, cultural heritage, water and songlines, rather than Santos' profits.

Despite the project receiving approval from both the State and Federal Governments, several pending approvals remain that Santos requires to green-light the project. This includes coming to an agreement in the National Native Title Tribunal, as Gomeroi Native Title Holders have not consented for Santos, or the New South Wales Government, to have access to their Country. Additionally, a pipeline that will connect the Pilliga gas field to the Hunter Pipeline, known as the 'Pilliga Lateral Pipeline’, is yet to receive sign off, and will require landholder approval. However, NSW Premier Chris Minns has stated that the government is willing to consider compulsory acquisition if necessary.

Our Film

'Run for Country' tells the story of community resilience and collaboration, with people from different movements and backgrounds coming together to celebrate and protect the Pilliga Forest at the 2025 'Pilliga Ultra'. This trail running event is a 'Run for Country', giving people from all over the opportunity to experience the beauty and biodiversity of the Pilliga, and join the fight to stop Santos' extraction and exploitation.