Climate change

Committed to a lower-carbon future

A better tomorrow needs action today

Our climate change strategy

Woodside accepts the scientific consensus on climate change

We support the Paris Agreement and its goal to limit the rise in global temperature to well below 2°C from pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5°C. To help reduce global emissions, our climate change strategy is to build and maintain a carbon-resilient portfolio including natural gas and new energy technologies. We are committed to limiting our greenhouse gas emissions through efficient operations and design together with carbon offsets.

Our vision

Woodside prospers in a lower-carbon world

Our strategy is underpinned by four pillars.

A sustainable future will require emissions reductions to be achieved whilst providing the safe, clean, affordable and reliable energy the world needs.

Woodside is well placed to be a part of the global energy transition. Our gas can help reduce emissions, displacing more intensive energy sources such as coal and biomass, while enabling customers to deliver affordable energy and climate action.

We build and maintain a carbon- resilient portfolio by conducting comprehensive financial forecasting that considers the risks and opportunities presented by a transition to a lower-carbon economy.

These include political risk, policy and regulatory developments, economic growth in our key markets, exchange rates, price shocks due to industry or producer behaviour, and specific technology developments that might impact demand for our products.

This forecasting process results in a range of oil and gas price assumptions, which inform our investment decisions. As a result, we are confident our growth projects align with a Paris-compliant world.

For more information on our how we are maintaining and building a carbon-resilient portfolio refer to our Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures aligned disclosures in our 2020 Annual Report.

We’re aiming to be net zero in our direct emissions by 2050 or sooner for our equity share of Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions. Scope 1 emissions are those that arise directly from our operations, such as from the use of fuel, flaring, or from the production of naturally occurring CO₂ from our petroleum reservoirs. Scope 2 emissions are those associated with the generation of any power that we purchase.

Woodside has set clear targets to reduce net emissions below the gross 2016-2020 annual average, on the pathway to our aspiration of net zero by 2050:

15% by 2025
30% by 2030.

We will meet these targets by:

Avoiding emissions through the way we design our facilities
Reducing emissions through the way we operate our facilities
Offsetting emissions, by both acquiring and originating quality offsets.

Offsets
In 2018, we established a carbon business focused exclusively on generating and acquiring offsets. We have invested more than A$100 million across Australia through native tree planting over the past 10 years. At the end of 2019, our partnership with CO2 Australia had offset more than 700,000 tonnes of CO²-e from Pluto LNG Train 1. The Woodside Native Reforestation Project, in partnership with Greening Australia, has planted 2,400 hectares in WA during 2020 which is estimated to sequester about 700,000 tonnes of CO²-e over 25 years.

New energy
We are committed to playing a role in the world’s energy transformation by developing new energy and low carbon solutions. We’re continuing to invest in improving our understanding of the role hydrogen can play in global decarbonisation, including:

Jointly investing more than A$40M with Monash University in the Woodside-Monash Energy Partnership to explore new energy technologies, including hydrogen
Progressing the proposed H2TAS Green Hydrogen project which has been shortlisted for the next stage of funding from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA)
Developing markets for LNG as a new and cleaner fuel for land-based use (e.g. remote power generation) and shipping. We have already successfully piloted these projects at small-scale
Looking for opportunities to use carbon capture and storage (CCS) at scale.

For more information on how we are limiting our emissions, refer to our Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures aligned disclosures in our 2020 Annual Report and 2020 Sustainable Development Report.

Rising mean air temperatures and the increased severity of tropical cyclones have been identified as the main physical risks to Woodside’s operating assets. These changes to the climate, among others, could impact the health and safety of our employees and our ability to meet production targets, as well as impact our operational infrastructure or disrupt supply chains.

We are continually working to improve our resilience to physical risks, including by enhancing our forecasting and risk assessment processes. Our people have been trained to monitor extreme weather events and have experience mitigating their impacts. For instance, we have already taken steps to ensure our assets are resilient to the impacts of rising air and sea temperatures, as well as rising sea levels, by factoring these risks into asset design, which is reviewed every five years.

We have engaged with industry partners and researchers in the field of climate science to enhance our ability to manage climate-related physical risks. For example, our metocean specialists are contributing to the development of industry guidelines for the assessment of physical climate risks through engagement with the IOGP Climate Change Task Force. We have also partnered with Chevron, INPEX, Shell and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology to improve tropical forecasting systems. Our partnership in this area contributed to ensuring the resilience of our assets when Tropical Cyclone Damien directly impacted our facilities in February 2020.

As the world’s population and living standards increase, more energy is required. This will present a challenge to meeting the Paris Agreement goals.

Woodside is a member of a range of industry associations in Australian and across the globe. We acknowledge there are diverse views on how best to achieve the Paris Agreement goals and commitments, and that we won’t always agree with all views articulated by associations, but through our memberships, we are working to influence the positioning of key associations in support of net zero.

Industry associations facilitate collaboration to develop climate solutions. They also generate significant debates that inform us and give us the opportunity to support the development of robust climate policy. Decisive action and collaboration are key to addressing the climate challenge, including working with industry associations to support a lower-carbon future.

Read more about our approach to managing alignment on climate within our industry associations in our Industry Association Review Report.

Our Climate Change Policy outlines our commitment to promoting natural gas in the global energy mix as a means to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, support renewable energy and improve local air quality.

In addition, our climate-related government submissions can be viewed on our website.

We must develop resources in a way that is as carbon-efficient as possible. It’s up to us, as industry leaders, to ensure this is prioritised

Peter Coleman, CEO & Managing Director

Clear targets to decarbonise

We have set clear targets to reduce net emissions below the gross 2016-2020 annual average, on the pathway to our aspiration of net zero by 2050:

15%
by 2025¹
30%
by 2030²
Net zero
aspiration by 2050

Find out more

¹ Equivalent to previously disclosed equity reservoir offset target.

² Baseline is set as the gross average equity Scope 1 and 2 emissions over 2016-2020 and may be adjusted (up or down) for potential equity changes in producing or sanctioned assets, with an FID prior to 2021.