North West Shelf: Woodside Energy and Federal Government extend talks on Karratha Gas Plant’s future

Woodside Energy’s talks with the Federal Government over the future of the North West Shelf will remain ongoing after the deadline for a response on the environmental conditions was extended.

The company wants to run the Karratha Gas Plant until 2070 and has been waiting almost seven years for approval. The plant’s future will be key to the development of the $30 billion Browse project, which is being assessed separately.

Environment Minister Murray Watt endorsed the Karratha life extension late last month, subject to what he claimed would be strict conditions to protect the ancient Indigenous Murujuga Rock Art nearby.

ASX-listed Woodside had 10 business days to respond — a response due today — to formalise the approval, but the Government gave the gas giant an extension.

“Woodside and the North West Shelf Joint Venture are continuing constructive consultation with the Federal Government,” a spokeswoman for the company said on Friday morning.

“The parties have agreed to an extension of the consultation period regarding the Government’s proposed conditions as part of the North West Shelf project extension environmental approval process.”

“Woodside recognises the importance of the matters being addressed by the proposed conditions of the environmental approval including cultural heritage management and air quality.”

The North West Shelf venture was Australia’s first gas exporting plant, shipping the fuel in liquid form to trading partners including Japan, South Korea and China. Woodside operates the project and is backed by investors including Shell, Mitsui, Mitsubishi and BP.

The Woodside spokeswoman also said the North West Shelf had supplied more than 6000 petajoules of domestic gas into WA over the past four decades — enough to power Perth’s homes for about 175 years.

But the project has become a lightning rod for criticism amid ongoing moves to slash carbon emissions to net zero by 2050 in the fight against climate change.

Life-cycle emissions from Karratha’s production would be more than 80 million tonnes of CO2 annually, and the industry already emits 8 per cent of Australian greenhouse gases.

The Karratha plant is located on the Burrup Peninsula, neighbouring ancient rock art which forms part of a World Heritage application.

There has been strenuous debate over the project’s impact on that rock art, with a recent report by Curtin University scientists key to the Federal Government’s decision.

The Greens and the Australian Conservation Foundation called on the Government to make the approval’s conditions public.

“The proposed conditions Minister Murray Watt has set for Woodside’s plant should be made public and transparent so they can be independently scrutinised by scientists,” ACF spokeswoman Piper Rollins said. Ms Rollins asserted that science had been “suppressed” to date.

“Australians who are worried about the protection of the ancient Murujuga rock art, which has been nominated for World Heritage listing and is right next door to Woodside’s gas hub, deserve to see what Woodside is being allowed to negotiate behind closed doors.”

She said the foundation had calculated the emissions from production and consumption of the gas from the Karratha plant and neighbouring Pluto facility over coming decades would be 13 times Australia’s annual emissions.