One of Australia's biggest energy company compares Victoria to North Korea

Sydney Morning Herald

28-05-2025

D'Ambrosio on Wednesday said a combination of lower demand and new gas investment – including a $350 million ExxonMobil and Woodside program to drill new wells in Bass Strait – had helped push out the market operator's forecast gas shortfall from 2028 to 2029.
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The Victorian government had approved the only new application for a gas production permit it had received in the past 10 years, and was seeking to fast-track other approvals, she added.
'We've always said gas is part of our energy transition,' D'Ambrosio said. 'We're working to bring on more gas supply.'
There are eight gas-exploration permits onshore in Victoria and three exploration permits in offshore Victorian waters.
Speaking at the Australian Energy Producers (AEP) conference in Brisbane on Wednesday, Gallagher said ambiguity over state and federal environmental approvals processes made Australia one of the most difficult places to sanction new investments.
'We've got 100 years of gas under our feet,' he said. But only a 'fraction' of Australia's known prospective gas basins were presently in development, he said.
Work ground to a halt at Santos's $5.8 billion Barossa gas project off the Northern Territory in 2023 after environmental lawyers secured last-minute legal orders to block the construction of a pipeline by arguing the company had not adequately consulted Tiwi Islander traditional owners – claims that were later dismissed.
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Its controversial Narrabri gas project in northern NSW, which could deliver up to half of NSW's natural gas needs, has also run into years of delays amid legal appeals and objections from environmental activists, some landholders and the Gomeroi traditional owners, who fear the plans to drill 850 gas wells could inflict irreversible damage on their culture, lands and waters and worsen global warming.
Federal Resources Minister Madeleine King this week put oil and gas executives on notice that the re-elected Albanese government will make them do more to avert local energy shortfalls.
Speaking at the AEP conference on Tuesday, King said Australians were 'tired of seeing our vast gas resources exported overseas' while paying high prices at home.
Some Australian LNG producers were 'doing the right thing' in ensuring the market had enough gas, added King, who pointed to agreements struck this year to divert an extra nine petajoules of gas to stave off a quarterly supply deficit. 'I thank them for that,' she said.
'But there remains a lot of work to do to ensure the domestic market remains well supplied.'