The
Australia Institute,
“Weapons
of gas destruction: Lifting the lid on greenhouse gas emissions from
Australian fossil gas projects and resources” September
2020,
excerpt from Discussion Paper summary:
The
fossil gas industry in Australia tripled production from 1990 to 2010
and then from 2010 to 2019 production tripled again. Nearly all of
the new production was exported. Australia
has become the world’s largest exporter of liquified natural gas
(LNG) and one of the world’s biggest gas producers. Australia’s
gas and coal exports make Australia’s the third largest exporter of
fossil fuels in the world, after Russia and Saudi Arabia.
Over
the decade to 2018 Australia was responsible for most of the growth
in LNG, and a third of the growth over the last 20 years, more than
any other country Australia’s share of global gas production soared
in recent years, even as its share of global proven gas reserves
levelled out.
Australian
Government publications list 22 new gas production and export
proposals across Australia with an estimated gas production capacity
of 3,368 PJ pa. Governments and companies are preparing to exploit
further gas resources in the ground that are larger still.
Despite
calls for decarbonisation be central to the economic recovery from
the coronavirus pandemic, the Australia government is proposing
policies and subsidies for what it calls a “gas fired recovery”.
From an economic and employment perspective, this makes little sense.
There are many low cost ways to reduce gas consumption, and the
industry, despite its size, employs few Australians. Expanding fossil
gas production also threatens to release large amounts of greenhouse
gases.
Burning
fossil gas releases carbon dioxide (CO2). In addition, extracting,
processing transporting and exporting fossil gas is also highly
emissions intensive, and already responsible for more than 10% of
current Australian emissions, on official government data. A large
portion of these emissions come from gas burned by LNG facilities.
Australian
LNG facilities burn around nine percent of all gas they receive to
help liquify the remaining gas for export. Gas consumption in LNG
facilities is double the size of whats consumed by Australian
households and about as large as what is consumed by Australian
manufacturing.
Another
major climate impact is ‘fugitive’ emissions from flaring,
venting and leakage. The
true impact of these emissions is larger than officially reported.
Fossil gas is made up mostly of methane, itself a greenhouse gas with
much greater heat trapping potential than CO2. While methane is more
powerful than CO2 over a 100 year timeframe, which is the
conventional basis for comparison, methane traps far more heat over
the nearer-term (a 20 years horizon). A small amount of methane loss
greatly increases the climate impact of fossil gas.
Many
recent studies show rates of methane loss much higher than the
Australian government’s official figures, especially in
unconventional gas production, such as coal seam and shale gas where
techniques like hydraulic fracturing are required. Methane loss at
rates observed in recent studies of large US shale gas fields range
from 2.3% to 3.7%, at the higher end delivering a near-term climate
impact equivalent to doubling the emissions of the burnt gas.
Reducing and avoiding the release of methane emissions is essential
to meeting the Paris Agreement climate goals.
There
are 22 major new gas projects proposed by companies and listed by the
Australian Government’s Office of the Chief Economist. The analysis
here converts the supply capacity into common units for comparison
and aggregation. The proposed projects are spread across the country
and are of various sizes, types and stages. The largest projects are
offshore fields designed for gas export, especially off Western
Australia’s coast. The single largest project, Woodside’s Browse
/ Burrup Hub Extension, would involve piping gas from a large new gas
field nearly 1000km through new undersea pipelines to an onshore
facility for export…...
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