Gleaming green frogs barely larger than a child's hand are set to be a major winner as energy company Shell packs up a decommissioned crude oil refinery at Clyde, in Sydney's west.
Its subsidiary, Viva Energy, is removing some of the redundant equipment including 26,000 tonnes of steel pipes and towering storage tanks that have been in operation since 1928.
As part of a planning agreement with the NSW Government, the Shell subsidiary will be implementing a habitat cultivation plan for a rare frog breed that has settled along the Parramatta river site.
Green and golden bell frogs are endangered and there are only two thriving populations in Homebush and Flemington. Unusually, they tend to thrive in industrial settings as they have high tolerance for salt and heavy metals.
The local population in the wetlands next to the hulking oil processing centre is understood to be small, but the Australian Museum's amphibian biologist Jodi Rowley told Fairfax Media the right steps could see it explode.
"These guys are in trouble, but in the right conditions they become the weeds of the frog world. They lay thousands of eggs, grow fast and can move a kilometre a night," Dr Rowley said.
The Viva Energy conservation plan includes constructing a specialised breeding space in the wetlands to the north-east of the refinery demolition site, as well as extensive weeding.
All staff and contractors will be trained to wash shoes, wheels and any tools they are taking into the wetlands. Specially trained team members will conduct daily checks throughout the active work sites to collect misplaced frogs and return them to the water.
Even the inevitable mess that comes with dismantling a major established site could work in the frog's favour.
"Chemicals in the water can actually benefit this tough little frog, because it can kill off the fungus that would otherwise kill the frogs ," Dr Rowley said.
Green and Golden bell frogs were such common native species in the 1960s they were often used for high school science lab dissections.
But the introduction of harmful kinds of fungus and also the tadpole-eating mosquito fish saw the population decline 90 per cent since then.
