The Australian Government’s decision to approve Woodside’s NWS export project is a disaster.
Fri 12 Sep 2025 16.00 AEST
Photo: AAP Image/Mick Tsikas
As the second largest fossil fuel exporter in the world, and fifth largest fossil fuel producer, Australia has an enormously disproportionate impact on the world’s climate. Coal and gas exported from Australia are making Australia and the rest of the world hotter and drowning our Pacific neighbors.
When the new Labor Government was elected in 2022 on a wave of public support for strong action on climate change, the Prime Minister said the government’s new climate targets reflected their resolve to:
“… urgently step up the pace of action, and work alongside global partners and particularly with our Pacific family, to tackle the climate crisis and keep 1.5 degrees within reach.”
Since then, the Government certainly acted urgently to step up the pace of action, but unfortunately to make climate change worse not better! The tranche of enormous new fossil fuel projects it has approved that dwarf the tepid measures they have taken to reduce emissions elsewhere.
None more so than the decision to approve a 45-year extension of Woodside’s North West Shelf gas export project (NWS), the largest and most polluting gas export terminal in Australia. The decision is completely at odds with the PM’s claim to want to “keep 1.5 degrees withing reach.” The IEA, UNFCCC and UN Secretary-General and scientists in Australia and around the world have all declared that new fossil fuel projects are incompatible with keeping global temperatures below 1.5 degrees.
Make no mistake, this is the most important decision this government will make on climate, with impacts that make any emissions savings from its renewable energy polices look trivial. In fact, the government’s renewable energy policies could be interpreted as greenwash to distract from the far more consequential decisions approving new fossil fuel projects like this.
This single decision will result in around 4.3 billion tonnes of emissions, the equivalent of building 12 new power stations, making a mockery of the Government’s incremental policies on renewables and the Safeguard Mechanism.
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Vanuatu’s Climate Minister Ralph Regenvanu expressed the dismay of many Pacific leaders, saying that the decision to approve the NWS extension could be in breach of a landmark International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on the responsibility states have to address climate change.
The approval exposes the Australians Governments assurances to our Pacific neighbours that we had “heard” them on climate change as empty platitudes.
But the NWS approval is not only a betrayal of our Pacific neighbours. It is a betrayal of Australians.
Labor will soon release of a National Climate Risk Assessment, that is reportedly “dire” “diabolical” and “extremely confronting, including “shocking” forecasts of sea level rise. But the most shocking thing is that with a full understanding of the appalling impacts climate change on its own citizens, our government would go right ahead and approve a 45-year extension one of the biggest fossil export projects in the world.
To add insult to injury, Australians get almost nothing in return for allowing this climate destroying project.
The project will be largely fed by royalty-free gas, meaning the Australian Government is giving Woodside and its partners most of the gas for free, The Australia Institute has estimated that these companies will receive around $215 billion of royalty free gas, amounting to probably the greatest ever giveaway of Australia’s resources.
Far from adding to the supply of gas in WA, the NWS extension undermines Western Australia’s energy security. It allows Woodside to export enough gas to supply Western Australia for around 90 years, despite Western Australia facing looming gas shortages and price increases.
It will also increase the cost of energy for Western Australians. Australia Institute analysis shows the North West Shelf project has already tripled WA wholesale gas and electricity prices a since it began exporting WA’s onshore domestic gas reserves in 2020, exposing WA to global prices. Because of the projects vast unfilled demand for gas to export, it will create an enormous incentive to export even more of WA’s domestic gas supply, driving up domestic energy prices and increasing the risk of shortages.
The Australian Government’s decision to approve Woodside’s NWS export project is a disaster for the climate that will make Australia and the rest of the world hotter, and make fires, floods, sea level rise and other disasters more frequent and extreme. It flies in the face of the Australians Governments promises to Australians and our Pacific neighbors to take urgent action to fight climate change and provides little economic benefit to Australians.
The Australian government is putting the profits of multinational oil and gas corporations ahead of Australians and our Pacific neighbors.
Mark Ogge is Principal Advisor at The Australia Institute.
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