US oil and gas supermajor Chevron is the major LNG producer in WA with its Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG projects and a share in the North West Shelf project.
Shell, Exxon and Chevron are big players in Australian oil and gas and being forced to decarbonise sooner will affect their local operations, with a possible king hit to Prelude.
Maintenance contractor UGL has used a clause designed to ensure safety during a strike at Chevron's Gorgon LNG to portray the industrial action as illegal.
Safety regulator WorkSafe does not know when it will receive test results so four workers on Chevron's Gorgon LNG plant will know if they have received an unsafe exposure to toxic mercury.
Chevron's Wheatstone LNG is in the firing line of a new approach from the WA Environmental Protection Authority that forced big emissions cuts from the Waitsia gas project.
WA's industrial greenhouse gas emissions are dominated by four products and a handful of companies, including a few that have managed to keep a low profile in the climate wars.
Most big WA carbon polluters including Chevron, Adbri, South32 and Woodside are wanting on emissions reduction targets, strategy and cash, according to benchmarking for the world's biggest investors.
Singapore's Pavilion Energy will buy Australian LNG from Chevron with certified greenhouse emissions, in another sign that Asian buyers are favouring less carbon-intensive gas.
Gorgon LNG's carbon emissions will jump by more than one million tonnes a year until Chevron fixes an underground pressure management problem that caused WA's safety regulator to curtail CO2 injection by two-thirds.
Technical problems at Gorgon and Wheatstone will give Chevron Australia another year of reduced LNG production while US headquarters remains hesitant about the energy transition.
The WA safety regulator has told Chevron to turn down Australia's $3.1 billion showpiece Gorgon LNG carbon capture and storage system until problems are fixed, meaning carbon emissions will rise.
Chevron has another pressure vessel to worry about, this time on the Wheatstone platform, after Gorgon LNG production was slashed this year to fix faulty welds.
Chevron slashes more than $US20 billion off its five-year spend due to lower demand and prices for fossil fuels but allocates just 2% of its 2022 budget to the energy transition.
