Santos chief executive officer Kevin Gallagher expects that a final investment decision (FID) will be made on the Moomba carbon capture and storage project in South Australia in September this year.
Gallagher highlighted in a conference call on the company’s 2020 full-year results that it is now waiting on the South Australian Government and the Clean Energy Regulator to set up an appropriate carbon trading scheme.
“They are working on the methodology statement that will support the accreditation of CCS projects. The expectation is that it will be done around September and then we will be in a position to take FID,” he said.
“We can’t take FID before that because that would then eliminate the possibility of the project being eligible for carbon credit.”
Santos’ Moomba CCS project proposes to capture the 1.7 million tonnes of carbon dioxide currently separated from natural gas at the Moomba gas processing plant each year.
It would then re-inject the carbon dioxide into the same geological formations that have permanently held oil and gas in place for tens of millions of years.
Gallagher further outlined that the Prime Minister Scott Morrison and the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction Angus Taylor are both supportive of the project and CCS qualifying for carbon credit.
“The Premier in South Australia [Steven Marshall] is also a big fan of this project because it won’t only help reduce emissions here in Australia, but it provides jobs for the long term,” Gallagher said.
“The Cooper Basin can take up to 20 million CO2 for the next 50 years at least. Its a phenomenal opportunity for Australia to really get on the front foot when it comes to emissions reduction technology.”