Peter Grieve has watched the Bylong Valley shift and change over eight decades. His favourite memories include seeing scores of tourists gather at the local showground for the once-renowned mouse races that were held annually for a quarter of a century. A recipient of the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM), Mr Grieve has spent his working life raising cattle on what he describes as one of "the most fertile pieces of country for the raising of livestock in the Commonwealth of Australia". "It's probably as good as there is on the planet," he said. You might need a fertile imagination to picture Bylong as a thriving community that once boasted its own cricket team, and warranted its own polling booth on election days. The last mouse race was a decade ago, the Catholic church is in disrepair, and the general store is locked up. The diesel bowser out the front is caked in grime, and set to an enviable $1.49 a litre. "It's a very different world in terms of population [now] … we don't have a polling booth today," he said. Bylong is still showing the after-effects of a massive fight against a proposed coal mine, a fight farmers like Mr Grieve ended up winning in the end. The battle saw them advocating to protect the soil and groundwater their livelihood depended on. It saw properties with immense heritage significance sold to an energy company that has the South Korean government as its biggest stakeholder. Kepco was so keen to build a mine in Bylong, it bought up 13,000 hectares of land. At one stage there was even talk of exhuming bodies that had been laid to rest in the early 1900s and moving them out of the way. What happened to Bylong? In 2010, Kepco took over a coal deposit in Bylong from multinational Anglo-American, and started a land shopping spree, spending $700 million. Some found the offers were too good to refuse; others decided against living on the doorstep of a coal mine. Kepco submitted a formal mining proposal in 2018, which was approved by the then-Coalition state government. But the NSW Independent Planning Commission (IPC) disagreed, finding the impacts on the environment, groundwater, and the climate were too great. Kepco then turned to the courts, but had appeals in the Land and Environment Court and Court of Appeals dismissed. In February 2022 the High Court of Australia refused the company's last-ditch appeal, meaning it had exhausted its final legal avenue to develop the project. Merran Auland and Phil Kennedy moved to town when the fight, dubbed the "battle for Bylong", was well and truly underway. They were quick to chose a side. "I just can't see why you could mine an area that's been listed in the top two per cent of agricultural land in New South Wales," Dr Auland said. "Why? Why would you contemplate digging all that up to sell coal to foreign owners?" Exploration licences Kepco is currently leasing its land to a large grazing company, but in December 2024 it applied to renew its two coal-specific exploration licences in Bylong for another three-year period. The New South Wales government is assessing those applications. The ABC contacted Kepco on numerous occasions, at its Sydney office and its head office in South Korea, but the company declined an interview and did not respond to any of the ABC's questions about its plans for the site. The ABC also contacted several NSW government ministers, aiming to ask what they know about Kepco's plans for Bylong. Representatives for the Planning Minister Paul Scully, Resources Minister Courtney Houssos, Energy and Environment Minister Penny Sharpe, and Regional Minister Tara Moriarty all declined an interview. The ABC attempted to obtain exploration reports lodged by Kepco through the Government Information Public Access Act, but that request was denied. The government has issued a statement, which said "all applications for the renewal of exploration licences will be assessed in accordance with the requirements of the Mining Act 1992 and the government’s exploration regulatory framework". Mystery plans In the absence of any concrete information, locals have been left to speculate about what the future might hold. Kepco has touted a hydrogen project and reports in Asian media outlets suggest it has also conducted a solar-farm feasibility study. "Solar power, solar panels and those sorts of things … not in an area like this," Mr Grieve said. Environmental advocacy group Lock The Gate (LTG) has worked closely with landholders in Bylong. Its NSW coordinator Nic Clyde said it was not appropriate for the community to be left in the dark. "People just hear rumours about what they're up to," he said. "It's hard to plan for the future … if the biggest landowner in your valley refuses to talk to the community and share information about what their plans are for this place into the future." Mr Clyde said the government should use its leverage to get answers. "There is an opportunity for buyback here, but it can't happen unless Kepco is willing to come to the table … I believe there are people who want to buy back into this valley. "There is no need to be exploring for new coal … it's crazy that there's any policy supporting that." The Bylong Valley Protection Alliance has suggested the region could be transformed into an agriculture innovation hub, with the land geared towards education and production. Merran Auland said governments, investors and Kepco should consider helping Bylong become "something really fabulous". "They could turn it into a model that the rest of the world could look upon and go, 'This is how you do regenerative agriculture', 'this is how you do organic', 'this is how you do education'.