Brooke Francom

Mr. Logan
11 December 2014
Australia
Australia supplies energy resources both internationally and domestically as it has large
resources in coal, uranium and natural gas. The oil, gas and energy industries are major
contributors to the Australian economy. Australia is the worlds largest exporter of coal with 60%
of the annual coal production being exported. Black coal deposits are found in New South
Wales and Queensland and are used for power generation and exportation. Brown coal
deposits are found in Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia, and Tasmania and are used
for domestic electricity generation. The majority of oil reserves are located off the coast of
western Australia, in the Northern Territory, Victoria, South Australia and Queenslands . Oil is
used mainly to produce petrol, diesel, and kerosene, but is also used in the production of
plastic, synthetic fibers. The worlds second largest producer of gold is Australia, after China. In
2012-13, the country exported 280 tons of gold valued at $15.1 billion. A few other resources
found in Australia that are big are Bauxite, and Uranium.
Throughout Australia, there are both many economic and environmental problems.
Some bigger environmental problems are, overfishing and illegal fishing, pollution, and
deforestation. When forests are cut, the salinity of the soil can greatly increase. As a result,
saline water draining from such areas can affect downstream or downslope water quality. It is
estimated that 7% of the agricultural areas of the Western Australia is suffering from the
problem of deforestation. With pollution, predictions estimate that each year almost 19,000 tons
of phosphorus and 141,000 tons of nitrogen are discharged to rivers flowing to the coast.
Alongside the environmental issues that go on in Australia, there are also economic issues. One
of them being that the price of oil has gone down, affecting peoples jobs if they work for oil
companies, and also in general affecting the prophet of oil refineries. The mining is also

struggling, because of the dropping price in precious metals, and a lot of this is due to the
slowdown of global economy.
There are many key factors for sustainability in Australia, one their tourism. There are
thousands of tourists coming every year to visit things like fishing, The Sydney Opera House,
universities (they are a very developed country), people like to visit the outback where they
hope to find Aborigine tribes, etc. Another key factor for sustainability is fishing. Australia is by
the ocean, making home to many fresh fish, and causing many to come for their beautiful scuba
diving. With only these few things you can already tell that with these and many others there are
plenty of key factors for sustainability in Australia.