Stopping Big Gas

Contrary to what you hear from the government and the gas industry, gas is a dirty fossil fuel, and is incompatible with the world’s goal to limit warming to 1.5 degrees. In Australia, at least 21% of carbon dioxide emissions come from gas. In order to reach net zero emissions by 2050, an essential step to limit global warming to 1.5C, we need no new investment in fossil fuels – including gas.

Australia is already almost halfway to powering our country with clean, affordable renewable energy, and gas usage is on the decline. Australia is one of the sunniest and windiest countries in the world – we could become a global leader in renewable energy and green industry exports. Australia has enough supply in existing gas fields to meet current domestic demand until 2032 – this gives us enough time to transition away from gas to renewables without any new projects.

Gas is a far more expensive energy source than renewables. In 2025, the average price of electricity from fossil fuels was almost twice the average price of electricity from renewables, putting pressure on households and businesses. This is partly because we pay international prices for gas that is extracted in Australia and collect barely any tax on it. Over half of the gas exported from Australia attracts zero royalty payments. Nurses pay more tax than the gas industry and students pay more in HECS than gas corporations contribute in petroleum tax. Gas is hardly a boon for Australia’s economy – we’re giving away tens of billions of dollars of it for free so multinational corporations can get richer.

The process of extracting gas poses a huge threat to Australia’s nature and wildlife. For example, the gas industry often uses dangerous seismic blasts to survey the ocean floor. These blasts are among the loudest human-made sounds in the ocean and can disrupt essential behaviours in marine life like whales, dolphins and fisheries. The gas industry also has a toxic reputation for spills, accidents, and abandoning its infrastructure in the ocean. Gas companies like Woodside are currently pushing to seismic blast along whale migration routes and drill near endangered turtle breeding grounds. If we want to protect precious, iconic species – some of which are found nowhere else in the world – we need to stop Big Gas from destroying wildlife’s homes.