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offset package. No further details were provided Technology Investment Roadmap. Investments
on what these projects would be or where in the due to be made under this roadmap include
state they would be located. those into low-emissions technologies such as
“We look forward to further discussions with hydrogen, solar energy, low-emissions steel,
the Western Australian Government to develop low-emissions aluminium and CCS.
lower-carbon projects and unlock emissions Globally, more and more countries are
reduction potential across the state,” said Chev- also targeting net zero emissions by 2050, and
ron Australia’s managing director, Mark Hat- the International Energy Agency (EIA) has
field, in a statement. described CCS as a critical process for emissions
cuts.
Test case And despite the Gorgon CCS project’s chal-
Gorgon is seen as a test case for the deploy- lenges to date, other LNG project developers
ment of CCS, especially at major fossil fuel- are also planning to build new CCS capacity to
based projects. Chevron is working to bring capture emissions from their liquefaction plants.
the facility to its full capacity, and has cap- Among these is QatarEnergy – formerly Qatar
tured an additional 500,000 tonnes of CO2e Petroleum – which is currently building its
since July, but critics continue to question the North Field East (NFE) expansion. NFE will be
technology’s effectiveness in the context of the the world’s largest gas liquefaction project, and
energy transition. will include a CCS facility that will also be the
“When you consider indirect (Scope 3) pol- largest of its kind in the LNG industry.
lution from burning the gas produced by Gor- Separately, US-based Venture Global LNG
gon, the CCS technology would have reduced recently unveiled plans to build CCS capacity to
overall pollution from Gorgon by less than 2%,” capture emissions from its newly built Calcasieu
the Conservation Council of Western Australia’s Pass export terminal, as well as the proposed
(CCWA) policy and legal director, Piers Ver- Plaquemines LNG facility. The project would be
stegen, was quoted by the Australian Financial the first CCS facility of its kind in the US, built
Review as saying this week. “This shows very to support existing LNG capacity. Other CCS
clearly that CCS cannot be relied upon as a tech- proposals have also been put forward in sup-
nology to allow fossil fuel production to con- port of liquefaction projects that have yet to be
tinue and increase,” he added. sanctioned.
Nonetheless, CCS is seen as a critical technol- Chevron’s experience at Gorgon serves as
ogy for decarbonisation both in Australia and a warning of the challenges that may lie ahead
globally. Indeed, this week the Australian fed- for these developments and others that may
eral government released the modelling behind emerge. However, this does not yet appear to
its recently adopted target of net zero GHG have deterred LNG exporters, which are seeking
emissions by 2050. CCS appears set to play a sig- a way to continue producing the super-chilled
nificant role, with 40% of emissions reductions fuel while still supporting the energy transition,
expected to be contributed by the government’s especially in the face of rising gas demand.™

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