North West Shelf Project
The North West Shelf Project, also known as the North West Shelf Venture, is an Australian resource development project, extracting natural gas from under the ocean from the North West Shelf off the coast of Western Australia. Running since the 1980s, it is Australia's largest such project. It involves the extraction of petroleum at offshore production platforms, onshore processing at the Karratha Gas Plant, and production of natural gas for industrial, commercial, and domestic use within the state, as well as the export of liquefied natural gas. The Karratha Gas Plant, which is located on the Murujuga Cultural Landscape, is operated by Woodside Energy. At least 5,000 sacred rock art sites were destroyed for the construction of the North West Shelf. The project has faced opposition from Ngarda-ngarli, Traditional Owners, of Murujuga since inception. The plant supplies up to 15 per cent of Western Australia's gas needs, with the rest exported overseas; none flows to the eastern states.
It was owned by a joint venture of six partners BHP, BP, Chevron, Shell, Woodside Petroleum and a 50:50 joint venture between Mitsubishi and Mitsui & Co with each holding an equal one-sixth shareholding. Along with being a joint venture partner, Woodside is the project operator on behalf of the other participants. In June 2022, BHP Petroleum merged with Woodside Energy, giving Woodside Energy a one-third shareholding in the project.
In 2020–2021, the North West Shelf Project was the single largest industrial emitter for Australia, according to the Clean Energy Regulator. The project was planned to be shut down in 2030, but, after the federal government spent six years assessing the matter, on 12 September 2025 Environment Minister Murray Watt gave final approval for the extension of the project until 2070, raising environmental and cultural concerns.
Overview
The North West Shelf Project involves the extraction of petroleum from the Carnarvon Basin off the north-west coast of Australia, mostly in the form of natural gas and condensate using offshore production platforms, as well as onshore processing. It produces natural gas for industrial, commercial, and domestic use within the state, as well as exporting liquefied natural gas. Woodside Energy Ltd is the operator for the North West Shelf Joint Venture, which proposed to continue and extend the operating life of the NWS Project, originally planned to have a 30-year lifespan. NWS is one of the largest LNG projects in the world, and a major employer in the region, underpinned by huge hydrocarbon reserves within the Carnarvon Basin.North West Shelf gas is processed at the Karratha Gas Plant on the Burrup Peninsula, which is operated by Woodside. Over 5,000 sacred rock art sites were destroyed to build the gas plant when it was built in the 1980s.
History
The land and sea where the North West Shelf now operate has been occupied for tens of thousands of years by Yaburara people. Evidence shows that even the seabed where North West Shelf trunklines were built, was occupied, given it was exposed during periods of lower ocean levels at multiple times throughout history. Ancient stone artefacts have been located on the seabed in the vicinity of North West Shelf Trunklines and Karratha Gas Plant. This shows that not only was the modern day Murujuga land occupied, but so too was much of the now-submerged seabed. The Yaburara, who are often considered a sub-group of the Ngarluma people or a language group in their own right, created the petroglyphs across the Murujuga cultural landscape, including a heavy concentration of rock art where the North West Shelf project is now located. Estimates put the age of the rock art where the North West Shelf was built, which would later be destroyed to build the onshore processing gas processing plant, at 50,000 years old.Discoveries of large gas reserves at the North Rankin, Goodwyn, and Angel gas fields within the Carnarvon Basin were made in the early 1970s. Extraction was technically challenging, and in order to make it commercially viable, unprecedented levels of investment were poured into the project, which began in the early 1980s. In the late 1980s, it was the largest engineering project in the world. With investments totaling A$25 billion since the early 1980s as of 2008, the project was the largest resource development in Australian history, and remains so in 2025.
The first phase of NWS included the development of the North Rankin A offshore drilling and production platform, a submarine pipeline to shore at Mermaid Sound in the Port of Dampier, and facilities for delivery of domestic gas via a pipeline to Perth and Bunbury, and provision for exporting excess condensate. The second phase involved building two LNG processing trains, along with storage tanks, export facilities, and tankers for transporting the LNG. The construction of the Karratha Gas Plant, the location of the LNG processing trains, mean approximately 5,000 sacred rock art sites were destroyed by dynamite and bulldozers. The Traditional Owners were locked out, unable to protect cultural sites. This was later described by Traditional Owners as “harm that cannot be described in words. This trauma is still here. Our people never consented to this destruction. Not only did we not consent, but we were blocked from even coming near the area while dynamite blasted our sacred sites and bulldozers systematically destroyed our Ngurra ”. Archaeologist Ken Mulvaney later wrote about the construction of the North West Shelf's Karratha Gas Plant, and the instruction from the state and proponents not to allow Aboriginal people near the sites. Mulvaney lamented that archaeologists tried to record rock art as bulldozers were crushing the sacred sites. He would write that “Much of the early industrial development of the Dampier Archipelago occurred prior to any heritage legislation, which was enacted for Western Australia in 1972. However, the North West Shelf Venture development of the Karratha Gas Plant at Withnell Bay occurred at a time when the heritage values of the archipelago where better understood. Salvage and recording in front of the bulldozer should never be the last resort of the concerned. As a nation we must value our entire cultural heritage The development push for the Dampier Archipelago continues apace, even when this results in the destruction of our cultural past”.
Despite construction in 1980s, and first production that decade, Woodside and the North West Shelf Joint Venture partners did not seek to enter a land agreement with Traditional Owners until after the Native Title Act was passed. Pressure mounted for the North West Shelf to enter a Land agreement, and an agreement was executed in 1998, though many Elders were unable to read or write and signed with an ‘X’. The Agreement does not provide royalties for Traditional Owners, and no royalties have been paid by the North West Shelf to Traditional Owners throughout its life. The Ngarluma Yindjibarndi Foundation Ltd is the party representing Traditional Owners for the 1998 Agreement, though NYFL has never received royalties.
In 2012 first two phases of the project received an Engineering Heritage International Marker from Engineers Australia as part of its Engineering Heritage Recognition Program.
NWS was owned by a joint venture of six partners BHP, BP, Chevron, Shell, Woodside Petroleum and a 50:50 joint venture between Mitsubishi and Mitsui & Co with each holding an equal one-sixth shareholding. Along with being a joint venture partner, Woodside is the project operator on behalf of the other participants. On 1 June 2022, BHP's Petroleum business merged with Woodside Energy, giving Woodside Energy a one-third shareholding in the project.
In 2019, Woodside and the other joint venture partners proposed to extend the life of the project, including the Karratha Gas Plant. On 28 May 2025, after spending six years on assessing the matter, the federal Environmental Minister Murray Watt approved the Karratha Gas Plant operation until 2070, drawing criticism from Traditional Owners and environmentalists. Existing gas fields are being depleted, and to continue the operation of the Karratha Gas Plant, gas reserves in the Browse Basin would need to be exploited. The Browse Basin is around off the north-west coast of WA, for which Woodside commenced seeking approval for in 2018. A previous project, Browse LNG, had been shelved as an onshore project at James Price Point in 2013, citing lack of economic viability. There had also been controversy over its siting by both environmentalists and Traditional Owners. James Price Point is close to the world's largest dinosaur footprints as well as several Aboriginal sacred sites. An alternative floating platform was being considered. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that the extended supply of gas was necessary to increase Western Australia's renewables, to provide "firming capacity" to encourage investment in renewables.
There are other technical issues with the gas in the Browse Basin, as the gas has a high percentage of carbon dioxide. In order to remain in line with emissions commitments, it requires a complex carbon capture and storage program, which may not prove economically feasible. Woodside's justification for the expansion of NWS is that if Australia does not produce more gas, it would need more coal. However, lead analyst for Australian gas at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, Josh Runciman, questioned this logic.
On 28 May 2025 Environment Minister Murray Watt provisionally approved the extension of the project until 2070. The conditions were not made public, pending a response from Woodside Energy, raising environmental and cultural concerns. On 12 September 2025 he gave final approval for the project, subject to 48 conditions, including reducing certain gas emissions by 2030, and reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. These conditions, along with additional new legal protections, are intended to protect the rock art. Peter Hicks, chair of the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation, approved of the conditions and thanked the government for providing certainty. However, former chair Raelene Cooper intends to take legal action against the government on behalf of her people, saying that Watt May have breached his statutory duties and international legal obligations.