Mining, despite providing limited short-term economic benefits, adversely affects ecosystems and has a much larger detrimental knock-on effect on the broader West Coast environment, economy and society over the long term. The risks associated with the projected mining activities include:

• Disturbance and destruction of marine life on mined beaches
• Destabilisation of fisheries and fishing communities
• Impacts on already scarce water resources
• Air pollution from mining activities
• Increased roads and traffic footprint and noise and air pollution
• Visual impacts on local population and tourism
• Loss of access to beaches and coastline for recreational activities such as surfing, trail running, hiking and fishing etc
• Damage to the fragile dune system, which has evolved over millions of years as part of the natural interface between land and sea
• Alteration of the natural beach profile, and its dynamic equilibrium with the wave energy
• Knock-on impacts on land-based ecosystems
• Lack of access to and loss of archaeological resources and fossils
• Lack of access to and loss of indigenous heritage sites