Woodside's North West Shelf extension the focus of another legal challenge

Australia Broadcast Center

16-06-2025

Yet another legal challenge has been lodged against a contentious gas plant extension in WA's north, arguing the state's previous environment minister failed to properly consider the emissions produced by customers burning gas produced at the facility.
The North West Shelf project has been processing LNG since the 1980s but needed fresh approvals from the state and federal governments to continue beyond 2030.
Then-WA environment minister Reece Whitby completed a six-year-long state approvals process in December last year when he approved the project with a range of conditions.
While federal environment minister Murray Watt is now considering the conditions the Commonwealth will impose, the Friends of Australian Rock Art group last week lodged an application in the WA Supreme Court, seeking judicial review of the state approval.
A statement by the group said it would argue Mr Whitby did not follow the state's Environmental Protection Act because the assessment his decision was based on "failed to consider the impact of climate change that would result from the project", including scope three emissions.
Scope three emissions occur as a consequence of a project, but from sources not owned or controlled by the owner of the project — for example, from a customer burning LNG processed at a particular plant.
Analysis by climate science policy institute Climate Analytics released this month estimated about 87 per cent of emissions linked to the North West Shelf between 2024 and 2050 were scope three.
The application could represent yet another legal hurdle for the project.
Mr Watt is yet to make a final decision, having given Woodside more time to respond to the conditions he is considering imposing.
Traditional owner Raelene Cooper said Mr Watt had promised to give her three business days' notice before making a decision, which could allow her to seek an injunction, further delaying his decision.
If ultimately granted, those approvals would allow Woodside to go through the separate process of getting approvals to extract gas from the Browse Basin, one of the country's largest untapped resources.
While Woodside and both levels of government see those plans as a boost to the WA economy and jobs, climate activists have long argued against the project and what its emissions will mean for a world trying to reach net zero by 2050.
Friends of Australian Rock Art co-convenor Judith Hugo said the application was brought because of concerns about the impact of emissions linked to the project on the world's climate, and on rock art at Murujuga.
Those petroglyphs are approximately 40,000 years old and are being closely studied to assess whether or not nearby industry, including the North West Shelf, is impacting on their condition.
"The North West Shelf Extension will cause pollution equal to 12 coal-fired power stations every year until 2070, however the vast majority of these emissions were ignored by the WA Minister in approving the proposal," Ms Hugo said in a statement, referring to scope three emissions.
"Our case aims to require the government to rectify this fundamental omission, so that the impacts of Woodside's carbon pollution can be understood.
"We have consistently raised concerns regarding sea level rise, increased wildfires, extreme heat and flooding and coastal erosion on the heritage landscape.
"We have also raised concerns about the ongoing use and enjoyment of this landscape by custodians practising cultural traditions, and by researchers and visitors in a heating climate.
A spokesperson for current WA Environment Minister Matthew Swinbourn said as the matter was before the courts, it was inappropriate for him to comment.
A Woodside spokesperson said the company was aware of the case.
"We have confidence in the robustness of the state government's comprehensive approval process," the spokesperson said in a statement.
Last week Woodside said it recognised the importance of the Commonwealth's proposed environmental approval conditions, "including cultural heritage management and air quality".
Tom Hatton, who chaired WA's Environmental Protection Authority between 2014 and 2020, said he never saw it as the agency's role to regulate scope three emissions.
"For exported gas, those scope three emissions happen in jurisdictions outside of Australia, so it was never considered something that the state government, on advice from the EPA, would ever feel that they should condition, or put any conditions, on," he said.
While Dr Hatton said it "remains to be seen" whether scope one or two emissions, produced directly by projects, were best regulated by state or federal governments, he remained firm on his view on scope three even after leaving the regulator.
"It would be a confusing international analysis, international arrangement, for Australia to do that."
Curtin University sustainability professor and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report author Peter Newman said addressing global warming needed to be seen as a partnership.
"This process of being serious about climate change is not just a matter of who's really responsible for this and who's not, it is a matter of fixing it," he said.
"And we have to get serious about fixing it otherwise we're not going to solve this problem and the temperatures are going to get so bad that all of our economies are going to struggle and so many millions of people will be dying from it.
"Some part of government needs to take hold of that and run with it and the EPA is as good a place as any."