The Woodside-operated North West Shelf project near Karratha exported Australia's first LNG cargo in 1989 and now has five trains and a domestic gas plant.
Decommissioning
If Woodside absorbs BHP's oil & gas assets new laws ensure the massive decommissioning liability falls to one of the companies, not the Australian taxpayer, unlike the Northern Endeavour.
Woodside Petroleum
Buying BHP’s Australian oil and gas assets could allow Woodside to escape its lost decade, but its shareholders and Australian taxpayers should count their fingers after the handshake.
Safety
Woodside has found corrosion during a shutdown of the North West Shelf's LNG Train 4 that potentially is a serious concern. It is understood Woodside is now inspecting other trains for the problem.
Safety
Woodside must check if corrosion on fourteen 24-tonne caissons under an offshore platform could cause them to fall onto subsea pipelines with possibly catastrophic results.
APPEA 2021 Perth
Plentiful and cheap gas to WA may be undermined by pressure from North West Shelf LNG participants and Perth Basin producers for the McGowan Government to weaken its ban on the export of onshore gas.
Carbon Emissions
BHP's climate target excludes the Bass Strait, North West Shelf and future Scarborough LNG on the incorrect basis that the operator controls the emissions, not the joint owners.
Energy Transition
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.
Energy Transition
For Woodside, it is Scarborough or bust. Incredibly the LNG specialist has no plan B ready if its last chance to develop an LNG project evaporates. And Scarborough is no sure thing.
Carbon Emissions
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.
Carbon Emissions
Woodside wants to sanction its $US11.4 billion Scarborough LNG project in 2021, but a legal challenge to regulatory approval for years of carbon emissions could put it in a two-year legal limbo.
Gas
BP's Ironbark well off WA is a duster with "no significant hydrocarbon shows" killing hopes of gas supply to the North West Shelf LNG plant and crashing shares in Cue and NZ Oil and Gas.
LNG
The Conservation Council has launched legal action against Woodside and the WA Government that may reopen environmental approvals essential to the Scarborough and Browse LNG projects.
Chevron
Chevron prepares to restart a Gorgon LNG train after losing more than $500M of production to repair faulty welds. Two trains to go.
LNG
BP, unlike Chevron, remains committed to Woodside-operated North West Shelf LNG as it waits to drill nearby Ironbark, but Browse is unlikely to meet its investment criteria.
LNG
Chevron's slice of the North West Shelf LNG project is touted as ideal for infrastructure investors. It is the opposite - highly risky, complex and dysfunctional.
Domestic Gas
Santos is now the biggest supplier of gas to WA and the future may depend on the Perth Basin after the State's almost four decades of reliance on Australia's first LNG plant.