Capturing and burying carbon emissions will likely be discussed by oil and gas industry leaders, at global climate talks in Azerbaijan. But on a remote island off Western Australia, troubles at a project tipped to be a flag-bearer for the technology have many questioning whether it can work at all. The ABC paid for travel on a Chevron chartered plane to access Barrow Island.
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00:00A monster by name, and a monster by nature, the Gorgon gas plant on a remote island off
00:07the Pilbara coast is the single biggest resources project ever built in the country.
00:12Now Gorgon plays a central role in providing the energy to a growing Asia Pacific region
00:18as well as to the energy security of Australia.
00:21But it's Gorgon's massive emissions that are giving headaches to its owners, led by US
00:26oil and gas giant Chevron.
00:28To curb these emissions, the company built a multi-billion dollar plant to capture and
00:33bury much of the project's carbon.
00:35But five years after the plant started operating, barely one third of the promised emissions
00:40cuts have been delivered.
00:42Technical problems caused by the infiltration of water have plagued operations.
00:48Chevron insists the problems can be fixed and maintains the technology works.
00:52All studies that you look at, whether it's IEA or other sources, say that carbon capture
00:58and storage must be part of the solution going forward.
01:00The role of carbon capture and storage is hotly contested, but many experts say reaching
01:05net zero without it is all but impossible.
01:08CCS first and foremost is one of the key decarbonisation pathways.
01:12For all the backing of carbon capture and storage from industry, critics of the technology
01:16remain unconvinced.
01:17They say Gorgon buries just a tiny amount of carbon in the global context, while it
01:22does nothing to prevent the emissions from the burning of that gas by its customers.
01:28The Gorgon sequestration project stores around 1.6 million tonnes per annum last financial
01:35year, and that's around half a percent of Australia's annual emissions.
01:41Backers say Gorgon's problems shouldn't be confused with the broader potential of carbon
01:45capture and storage, but doubters say it's emblematic of all that's wrong with the technology.
01:50It's very problematic.
01:51It's the wrong type of application of CCS.
01:55With temperatures rising, pressure is building to prove carbon capture and storage can work.