Badja Station Regeneration Project

The Badja Station Regeneration Project is a Human-Induced Regeneration (HIR) project located on the Badja Station pastoral lease in the Shire of Yalgoo, Western Australia. Situated in the Mid West region, the project area lies approximately 50 kilometers south of the township of Yalgoo and 120 kilometers southwest of Mount Magnet. Registered in November 2018, the project initially covered a vast expanse of approximately 104,411 hectares. The project is managed by Gregory and Cindy Payne of the Badja Family Trust, working in conjunction with carbon service provider Select Carbon Pty Ltd (now a subsidiary of Shell).

Human-Induced Regeneration projects in this context focus on restoring native forest cover by removing the activities that previously suppressed vegetation growth. For Badja Station, the primary project activities involve the strategic management of grazing timing and extent, alongside the humane control of feral animals such as goats. By reducing the pressure from livestock and feral herbivores, the project aims to allow the naturally occurring seed banks and rootstock, specifically native species suppressed for at least 10 years, to regenerate into a permanent even-aged native forest.

The environment of the Yalgoo region is characterized by a hot semi-arid to arid climate, often described as "mulga rangelands." The area typically experiences low and irregular rainfall, averaging around 200mm to 250mm annually, which drives the region's primary land use of extensive pastoral grazing (sheep and cattle). The soils in this locale are generally red earths, sandy loams, and laterite, supporting vegetation dominated by Acacia species (such as Mulga) and native shrublands.

An interesting aspect of this project is its location's history and biodiversity value. Badja Station has previously been the subject of diverse land-use proposals, including a 2015 proposal by a mining company to host a radioactive waste facility, which did not proceed. In the context of carbon farming, the station serves as a site for biodiversity monitoring; surveys have been conducted to track the presence of the vulnerable Malleefowl (Leipoa ocellata) within the regenerating shrublands. Additionally, the project holds a fixed delivery contract with the Australian Government to supply over 60,000 Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs).