Clive Palmer latest recruit to anti-coal seam gas campaign

Mining kingpin Clive Palmer has hopped aboard the anti-coal seam gas bandwagon, accusing the industry of using "lethal" technologies that could have devastating health and environmental impacts.

Queensland's richest man is the latest recruit to an unlikely alliance of conservatives, farmers and greenies opposed to the controversial gas extraction technique. Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce, Greens leader Bob Brown and talkback host Alan Jones have all called for greater regulation of the fledgling industry.

"Coal seam gas technology currently used in Australia is lethal and will kill Australians, poison our water table and destroy the land," Palmer told the National Party's federal council in Canberra over the weekend.

The billionaire said a leading Chinese firm had raised issues with him about the Australian CSG industry, saying extraction techniques they abandoned 20 years ago are still being used.

The Queensland government has begun investigating a CSG operation west of Brisbane after the discovery of traces of cancer-causing chemicals.

The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association (APPEA) has dismissed Palmer's concerns as "complete rubbish".

"Australia has safely produced CSG for more than 15 years and around 90 per cent of the gas Mr Palmer uses in his Queensland home is CSG," APPEA chief executive Belinda Robinson told The Australian.

"It's an industry that relies upon tried and tested technology and which has undergone years of environmental approvals; processes which have consistently deemed the risks to be minimal and manageable."

A Galaxy poll commissioned by The Greens found 68% of Australians support a moratorium on coal seam gas mining.

Clive Palmer owns Minerology, a mining company with access to 160 billion tonnes of iron ore reserves in remote Western Australia. He has been a member of the National Party for 40 years.