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We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.
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Key developments
Weather drives food price spike
BITTER TRUTHS: Cocoa futures contracts being traded on the New York commodities exchange “hit an all-time high above $12,000 per tonne in April”, but fell below $9,000 this week “on the news of rains arriving in west Africa”, the Financial Times reported. The “wild swings” that are “enough to be bankrupting for a lot of people” are “a sign of market volatility and stress following successive poor harvests in Ivory Coast and Ghana” – the world’s two top producers of cocoa. Both countries, along with Nigeria and Cameroon, “have seen drastically reduced crop yields amid droughts, fires and other climate change-induced weather phenomena”, African Business reported, further “exacerbated by decades of underinvestment in the sector”. Farmers are having to “pursue alternative revenue streams”, the outlet added. The crisis facing the cocoa sector points to a systemic problem, the Guardian wrote: “Faced with global heating, increasing conflict and energy price instability, depending on the free market is a poor bet.”
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‘HEATFLATION’: A global olive oil shortage brought on by drought and extreme heat in Europe has driven prices to record highs and even “fuelled a crime surge”, CNBC News reported. Spain, the world’s largest olive supplier, saw output cut between 30-50% of its usual 1.3m-tonne harvest, with Spanish supermarkets reporting that “olive oil had become the most stolen item” across the country, the story added. Helena Bennett at policy thinktank Green Alliance UK “unequivocally attributed the record spike in olive oil prices to climate change”, telling CNBC: “It’s happening to other food crops too…Olive oil today, everything else soon.” The experts who predicted last year that “heatflation” would send olive oil price’s skyrocketing “were right”, Salon wrote.
‘SOGFLATION’: Meanwhile, the UK is staring at the costs of “sogflation”, according to Bloomberg. Bread, beer and biscuit prices “look set to rise sharply” after a wet winter impacted crops across the UK, according to new analysis by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), the Press Association reported. According to ECIU, yields of key crops such as wheat, barley, oats and rapeseed “might drop by 4m tonnes” compared to 2023, with wheat slated to see a 27% drop. Between October 2022 and March 2024, England experienced “the wettest 18-month period since records began in 1836”, the Guardian said, resulting in “crops either being flooded[,] damaged…or farmers not being able to establish crops at all.”
Hotter ocean, burning mountains
MARINE HEATWAVES: The Indian Ocean “is experiencing unprecedented and accelerated warming” and could hit a rate of 1.7-3.8C per century “unless greenhouse gas [emissions] are reduced immediately”, Down to Earth wrote, reporting on new research. The work – which forms the chapter of a new book – found that marine heatwave days “are expected to rise” from 20 to 220-250 a year, meaning that “most of the Indian Ocean could be in a near-permanent state of marine heatwave conditions”, the story said. This could cause tropical cyclones to intensify rapidly, “putting fisheries and people living along the coastline at risk”, Mongabay wrote, reporting on the same study.
LAKSHADWEEP LOSS: The Hindu reported that researchers at India’s Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) recorded “widespread bleaching impacting coral reefs in the Lakshadweep Sea owing to marine heatwaves” this week. Since October last year, the Lakshadweep Sea – bordering India, Maldives and Sri Lanka – saw temperature “rises greater than 1C”, CMFRI scientists told the paper. “If the situation continues to rise, it could precipitate an unprecedented biodiversity crisis due to multispecies mortality,” said Dr KR Sreenath, senior scientist at the CMFRI. “The degradation of these ecosystems can lead to the collapse of local marine food webs, affecting a wide range of marine species, from fish communities to marine mammals like dugongs and dolphins,” he added.
FIRE IN THE MOUNTAIN: Meanwhile, on land, India reported a record 75,000 forest fires in April, according to the Hindustan Times. The eastern states of Odisha and Chhattisgarh and the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand were among the worst affected, with a senior forest official telling the paper that a “warmer-than-usual April and drier winter this year are the reasons for sudden spurt”. The mountainous state of Uttarakhand lost more than 142 hectares of forest to fires in just 72 hours, with “scanty winter rain” playing a major role in the 6,701 blazes that broke out in the hill state last month, another Hindustan Times story reported. A NewsLaundry investigation reported that Uttarakhand’s district authorities “ignored” warnings and deployed nearly all of their forest staff and vehicles for election duty during peak fire season, affecting “official preparedness to deal with the [fires]”.
Spotlight
Nature loss and climate change fuelling infectious diseases
In this spotlight, Carbon Brief reports on a new study finding that biodiversity loss is the largest driver of infectious diseases, with climate change, pollution and invasive species also increasing outbreak risks.
The role of environmental problems, such as climate change and biodiversity loss, in spreading infectious diseases to humans and animals has received renewed focus since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The root cause of the pandemic has never been identified, but some researchers suspect that the virus passed from bats to humans through an unknown intermediary animal, possibly a pangolin.
An infection or disease that has passed from an animal to a human is known as a “zoonosis”. Back in 2020, a range of scientists told Carbon Brief that such events could be increasing because of climate change, biodiversity loss and habitat destruction, which are each creating new opportunities for humans and animals to come into contact.
A new study in Nature conducted a meta-analysis of the available scientific literature to try to understand what the main global drivers of infectious disease risk could be for both humans and wildlife.
Data crunching
For the research, the scientists identified studies on the links between infectious disease and environmental change, a category that included biodiversity loss, chemical pollution, climate change, habitat loss or change and invasive alien species.
They extracted the relevant data from these studies to create a database detailing nearly 3,000 observations of infectious disease spread or harm in response to environmental change.
The next step was to standardise the data so that they could compare how different environmental change drivers affect infectious disease risk.
The results showed that biodiversity loss was the largest driver of infectious disease risk across the studies included in the database, co-lead author Prof Jason Rohr, an ecology and public health researcher at the University of Notre Dame in the US, told Carbon Brief:
“Biodiversity loss, climate change and alien species tend to increase infections, and urbanisation tends to decrease infections. These results were generally consistent across human and non-human diseases.”
Disease surveillance
The results could help policymakers to channel financial resources for tackling infectious diseases more effectively, Rohr said:
“The findings [we] uncovered should help target disease management and surveillance efforts towards global change drivers that increase disease.
“Specifically, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, managing ecosystem health and preventing biological invasions and biodiversity loss could help to reduce the burden of plant, animal and human diseases, especially when coupled with improvements to social and economic determinants of health.”
News and views
MAASAI MAROONED: Forty tourists and staff members marooned in Kenya’s Maasai Mara Game Reserve due to flooding were rescued by local authorities, the Star reported. Dozens “narrowly escaped death at dawn” when the Talek River, which runs through the park, burst its banks after “torrential” rains, the East African reported. The outlet added that visitors and workers were “forced to climb trees” after the camps became waterlogged. At least 11 people have died due to the floods in Narok and Bomet counties, the Nation said. Gazelles and giraffes were the most affected wild animals, with the floods “disrupting habitats, food sources and water availability”.
EARTH ANGELS: Seven environmental defenders from six different continents were awarded this year’s Goldman Prize. Widely described as the “green Nobel”, the prize is given out to campaigners for “sustained and significant” efforts to protect the environment, Reuters wrote, profiling India’s Alok Shukla and his role in the decade-long movement to protect the Hasdeo Arand forest from coal mining. Marcel Gomes, executive secretary at Repórter Brasil, won the prize for coordinating an international investigation that “pressured big European retailers to stop selling illegally sourced” beef, Mongabay reported. Other winners this year include Murrawah Johnson from Australia’s First Nations, Nonhle Mbuthuma from South Africa and Spain’s Teresa Vincente.
NICKEL FOR FORESTS: According to a Global Forest Watch report, primary forest loss in Indonesia increased by 27% in 2023 compared to the previous year, the Associated Press reported. While the report said this loss is “still seen as historically low compared to the 2010s”, some experts “saw concern in the recent uptick”, tying it to the “world’s appetite for mining Indonesia’s vast deposits of nickel, which is critical for the green energy transition”, the newswire wrote. AP added that Global Forest Watch’s data on deforestation is “higher” than official Indonesian figures.
BRAZIL FLOODS: Storms and flooding in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul have killed at least 78 people and displaced a further 115,000 people, Al Jazeera reported. The floods have caused damage to roads and bridges, triggered landslides and caused the partial collapse of a dam at a small hydroelectric power plant, the outlet noted. A second dam in the area is also at risk of collapsing due to rising water levels, according to BBC News. It added that the extreme weather has been caused by “a rare combination of hotter than average temperatures, high humidity and strong winds”.
G7 MEETING: A meeting of ministers from the G7 – Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US – in Turin saw countries restate and add detail to climate, energy and biodiversity commitments. Along with a much-publicised pledge to end new coal power by 2035, the G7 also committed to a “swift, full and effective implementation” of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) and to submit new national biodiversity plans ahead of the COP16 biodiversity summit in October. (France and Japan are the only G7 nations to have submitted plans so far and the US is not party to the UN biodiversity convention.) The G7 also said it would hold a workshop on implementing the GBF, with a focus on invasive species.
‘FIELDS OF FILTH’: Intensive meat and dairy farms in England have breached environmental regulations thousands of times in the past few years, according to a new investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. The organisation obtained investigation records from England’s Environment Agency describing more than 3,000 incidents, including “routine discharge of slurry and dirty water, maggot-infested carcass bins and the illegal incineration of pigs”. An Environment Agency spokesperson told the publication that there was a clear need for improvement, noting that around 80% of pig and poultry farm inspections resulted in advice and guidance, 16% resulted in a warning and around 2% resulted in a formal caution or prosecution.
Watch, read, listen
RESTORATION RETHINK: Dr Forrest Fleischman gave a talk at the Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery on the relationship between ecosystem restoration and social science, as large-scale restoration projects gain more traction as a climate solution.
OFFSETS INVESTIGATED: The BBC’s flagship investigations show Panorama exposed serious issues with company net-zero claims that rely on carbon offsets.
KILLER GANG: A Mongabay story reported on how a single poaching ring may have “wip[ed] out 10% of the entire global population of the critically endangered” Javan rhino.
SEDIMENT STRATEGY: A deep dive in Nature unpacked Maldives’ “race” to reclaim land from the sea to combat sea level rise, but critics say the environmental costs are too high.
New science
Asymmetric impacts of forest gain and loss on tropical land surface temperature
Nature Geoscience
A new study found that land-surface warming caused by tropical forest loss is stronger than the cooling produced by forest gain – a significant finding, since tree-planting is often viewed as a key climate solution. The authors used multiple sources of satellite data to understand how land temperatures responded to forest loss and gain, finding that loss caused warming of about 0.56C and afforestation only brought down temperatures by around 0.10C. This asymmetry has not been captured by current Earth-system models and “could overestimate the cooling effect of afforestation in future”, the authors said.
Global trends and scenarios for terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystem services from 1900 to 2050
Science
Climate change could become the largest driver of biodiversity loss by the middle of the century, new research suggested. The study used modelling to examine past and future drivers of global biodiversity loss. It found that during the 20th century, global biodiversity declined by 2-11%, with land-use change as the major driver. However, projections for the future suggested that climate change is likely to overtake land-use change to become the biggest driver by mid-century, especially under high emissions scenarios, the researchers said. They added that the findings “robustly show that renewed policy efforts are needed to meet the goals of the Convention on Biological Diversity”.
The positive impact of conservation action
Science
New research found that conservation actions improved the state of biodiversity – or at least slowed down biodiversity loss – but did not halt it “more than half of the time”. Researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 186 studies that measured biodiversity over time and contrasted conservation outcomes against areas where there were no measures in place to protect nature. Of all the conservation actions studied, invasive species control, habitat loss reduction and restoration, creation of protected areas and sustainable management had the highest impact. The authors concluded: “Conservation actions are investments rather than payments – and, as our study demonstrates, they are typically investments that yield genuine, high-magnitude positive impacts.”
In the diary
- 6-10 May: Nineteenth session of the UN Forum on Forests | New York City
- 13-29 May: Meetings of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity’s subsidiary bodies | Nairobi
- 14-17 May: FAO Regional Conference for Europe | Rome
Cropped is researched and written by Dr Giuliana Viglione, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Daisy Dunne, Orla Dwyer and Yanine Quiroz. Please send tips and feedback to cropped@carbonbrief.org.
The post Cropped 8 May 2024: Food price spike; Infectious diseases; Indian ocean heatwave appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Cropped 8 May 2024: Food price spike; Infectious diseases; Indian ocean heatwave
What if Australia’s worst offshore oil spill hasn’t happened yet?
I’m terrified by the thought.
Our new report in partnership with Environs Kimberley analyses Woodside’s own oil spill modelling and it reveals a worst-case blowout at the corporation’s proposed Browse gas project at Scott Reef could be up to 30 times larger than the Montara oil spill – one of Australia’s worst environmental disasters to date.
Woodside’s own modelling warns that oil pollution could spread across Scott Reef, the Kimberley coast and beyond, with impacts Woodside itself describes as “severe”, “potentially irreversible” and “catastrophic”.
What’s at stake?
Scott Reef really is like nowhere else on Earth.
Scott Reef is Australia’s largest freestanding oceanic reef, a pristine marine ecosystem that has thrived for around 15 million years. About 270 kilometres off the Kimberley coast, it supports more than 2,000 marine species, including endangered pygmy blue whales, nesting green sea turtles, the endangered dusky sea snake and ancient corals.
Yet Woodside wants to drill up to 57 toxic wells around and underneath it, causing decades of deafening seismic blasting, light and noise pollution, shipping traffic and, of course, the risk of a ‘catastrophic’ oil spill.
What did Woodside’s modelling find?
Before Browse can be approved, Woodside is required to assess what could happen if something goes wrong. We analysed the corporation’s own environmental assessment documents, and the findings are deeply concerning.
Woodside’s modelling shows that the most severe Browse scenario would be the worst oil spill in Australian history, releasing up to 893,739 barrels of condensate into the Timor Sea. For context, the Montara oil spill released 30,000 barrels of oil.
A blowout of this scale could see oil spread hundreds of kilometres, reaching some of Australia’s most important marine environments, extending into Indonesian and Timor-Leste waters and even washing up along parts of the Kimberley coast. Entrained oil – oil mixed throughout the water column – is predicted to travel up to 863 kilometres from the spill site.
The modelling identifies potential impacts to at least nine marine parks, eight reefs and three Indigenous Protected Areas, as well as important habitats for endangered species, including pygmy blue whales, green sea turtles, seabirds and other marine life.
These aren’t just places on a map. They are globally significant marine ecosystems that support ancient coral reefs, endangered wildlife, tourism, fisheries and coastal communities. A spill of this scale wouldn’t simply affect one reef; it has the potential to impact an entire connected marine ecosystem.
Why this matters now
The most important thing is that Browse has not yet been approved. That means there is still time to stop Browse and the serious risks outlined in Woodside’s own modelling.
The science has been done. The risks have been modelled. The decision now rests with the Australian Government.
Governments are often forced to respond after environmental disasters happen. This is one of those rare moments where they have the opportunity to act before one does.
What you can do
Together, we still have the power to stop Woodside and save Scott Reef.
You can help by:
- Sending an email to Environment Minister Murray Watt and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, calling on them to reject Browse.
- Sharing this story to help more Australians understand what’s at stake.
- Encouraging your friends and family to take action.
The more people who support saving Scott Reef, the harder it is for governments to approve Woodside’s drilling plans – Browse.
Together, we can ensure a reef that has existed for millions of years is known for its incredible biodiversity – not as the site of Australia’s worst oil spill.
Let’s save Scott Reef.
What if Australia’s worst offshore oil spill hasn’t happened yet?
Analysis by Greenpeace and Environs Kimberley shows that a severe oil spill at Scott Reef could be the worst in Australian history — Woodside has labeled the impact of such a spill ‘catastrophic’.
According to the fossil fuel company the impacts to Scott Reef ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’. Oily pollution could reach as far as the Kimberley coast to the coasts of Indonesia and Timor Leste while endangered marine species live, breed, forage and migrate within the potential disaster zone: whales, seabirds, turtles and other marine life are all at risk.
Report Summary
Woodside’s Browse drilling plans at Scott Reef have been found to pose unacceptable risks to the Western Australian environment once before. To secure their approvals under Federal and Western Australian law, Woodside has modelled a number of possible oil spill scenarios that could result from the Browse project.
Key Findings
- The most severe Browse scenario would be the worst oil spill in Australian history – up to 30 times bigger than the 2009 Montara oil spill disaster. According to Woodside, the environmental impact of such a spill would be ‘catastrophic’.
- Scott Reef and Sandy Islet could be covered in oily pollution. Woodside has conceded that the impacts to Scott Reef from a major spill ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’.
- A blowout of this scale could see oil washing up on the Western Australian Kimberley Coast, and affect at least nine marine parks, eight reefs, three Indigenous Protected Areas, and several islands in Australian, Indonesian and Timor Leste waters.
- Endangered and vulnerable marine species live, breed, forage and migrate within the potential disaster zone: whales, seabirds, turtles and other marine life are all at risk.
- A Browse oil spill threatens important tourism, diving, surfing and fishing hotspots, with potential ‘long term impacts’ for tourism operators in the Kimberley or visiting Rowley Shoals or Scott Reef.
Scott Reef: An ancient oceanic reef system
Scott Reef, located around 270 kilometres off the Western Australian Kimberley coast, is one of Australia’s largest oceanic reef systems. Ancient Scott Reef has been thriving for 15 million years, having adapted to changing seas. Today, it is a haven for marine life, providing vital habitat for more than a thousand species, including corals, fish, sharks and rays.
The deep waters surrounding the reef are home to 29 known species of whale and dolphin, including endangered pygmy blue whales, which travel along the Western Australian coast and stop at Scott Reef during their annual migration to forage and feed. The dusky sea snake, also classified as endangered, lives at Scott Reef. Sandy Islet, part of Scott Reef, is a nesting ground for a small population of genetically distinct green sea turtles, a species classified as vulnerable.
If Woodside, Australia’s largest oil and gas company, were to gain approval to drill for gas at Scott Reef, the ecosystem would face a barrage of industrial impacts, including seismic blasting, gas flaring, underwater noise, artificial lighting, pipe- laying, and fast-moving vessels over years of construction and operation. Add to that the risk of a major oil spill that could be Australia’s worst environmental disaster, with consequences spreading far beyond Scott Reef.
A disaster worse than Montara, according to Woodside itself
Woodside has proposed drilling 50 new wells around Scott Reef to extract oil and gas from beneath the reef as part of the Browse project. Woodside has proposed to build a 900-kilometre-long undersea pipeline to connect the Scott Reef-Browse site with its North West Shelf facility at Karratha in Western Australia, where the gas would be processed, mostly for international export. Woodside has modelled a number of possible oil spill scenarios that could result from the Browse project. Woodside performed this modelling to comply with mandatory environmental impact assessment requirements under Federal and Western Australian laws.
To identify which areas are at risk of an oil spill from the Browse project, Woodside engaged experts to conduct probabilistic modelling. Experts simulated different spills, noting which locations would be contaminated by oil and how much oil would make it to shore. They also assessed how likely each location was to be affected.
” Woodside’s ‘worst case’ scenario is a blowout at the Torosa gasfield, directly under Scott Reef.”
Greenpeace Australia Pacific and Environs Kimberley’s analysis shows an oil spill at Torosa could see 893,739 barrels of condensate spilled into the Timor Sea. This would be up to 30 times bigger than the 2009 Montara oil spill, considered one of Australia’s worst environmental disasters. Oil leaked into the Timor Sea for days after an oil rig caught fire off the Western Australian coast, causing a 90,000 square kilometre oil slick that spread all the way to Indonesia.
People, places and wildlife at risk
Woodside’s modelling shows that an oil spill at Scott Reef could affect eight reefs, at least nine marine parks and three Indigenous Protected Areas. In the event of a worst-case oil spill, Scott Reef and Sandy Islet, being closest to the wellhead, would be worst affected.
Woodside’s modelling finds that the impacts to Scott Reef from a major spill like this ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’. The impacts of an oil spill are not confined to Scott Reef – according to Woodside’s modelling, ‘hydrocarbon spills resulting from the proposed Browse to NWS Project have the potential to significantly impact shoreline habitats at Scott Reef, Ashmore Reef, Cartier Island and Rowley Shoals.’
Oil from a blowout could also reach neighbouring countries, including Pulau Rote, Savu, Sumba and West Timor in Indonesia, and Timor Leste. This is not an exhaustive list of all places that could be affected by an oil spill at Scott Reef. Once oil hits the water, its spread is influenced by the wind, tides, currents and other external conditions. An oil spill from the Browse project could have a less or more severe impact than the modelling indicates. Equally, Woodside cannot rule out other sites being affected.
A disaster for marine life
Woodside’s oil spill modelling shows that a blowout from the Browse project would put whales, turtles, seabirds, coral, significant feedstocks such as plankton and seagrass, fish, dolphins and other marine life at risk. According to Woodside, a Browse oil spill would:
- Directly threaten the coral at Scott Reef, with ‘potential for near total coral mortality in the worst affected areas’; a severe spill could also harm coral at Seringapatam Reef and the Rowley Shoals.
- ‘Significantly impact’ the plankton, seagrass and macroalgae that support the entire food chain.
- ‘Significantly impact bird species, including protected species’, which are ‘particularly vulnerable’ to oil spills.
A spill would not only threaten birds at Scott Reef, but those that nest or breed at Ashmore Reef and Cartier Island, Browse Island, islands along the Kimberley coastline (such as the Lacepede Islands) and Rowley Shoals. Woodside’s oil spill modelling specifically notes the potential risk to thirteen species of seabirds.
Oil spills also threaten whales and other cetaceans, especially concentrations of oil on the surface of the water. This can cause ‘sublethal and lethal effects’, especially when feeding, as whales and other marine mammals have been found to aspirate oil when breathing through an oil slick at the sea surface, thus absorbing hydrocarbons directly into their lungs, leading to sublethal and lethal impacts.
According to Woodside’s modelling, a Browse oil spill could be particularly harmful to the spinner dolphins living at Scott Reef with the potential for ‘a significant portion of this local population to be impacted in the event of a worst-case hydrocarbon spill’.
Marine reptiles, including the green sea turtles found at Scott Reef, are also at risk. Woodside’s modelling warns that an oil spill could cause ‘significant mortality amongst adults and hatchlings’, leading to ‘the potential for longer-term impacts on the Scott Reef – Browse Island genetic stock of green turtles’. Further, an oil spill could have lasting impacts on the breeding populations of olive ridley turtles, flatback turtles and hawksbill turtles. Essentially, all marine life found at or near the sea surface could be impacted by such a spill.
Woodside cannot be trusted
In Woodside’s inadequate response plan, Woodside states that it considers an oil spill to be ‘highly unlikely’ and the threat to the environment and wildlife to be ‘acceptable’. We do not believe these are credible assertions. For instance, the WA Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), which is assessing Woodside’s Browse to NWS proposal, did not agree. In August 2024, it emerged that the EPA advised Woodside that its Browse development posed ‘unacceptable’ risks to WA’s environment.
A potential oil spill from the Torosa field was one of the risks cited by the EPA in its preliminary decision not to approve the project. Woodside has subsequently revised its plans to drill for gas at Scott Reef, proposing to use unproven new technology that the company claims would bring a spill under control more quickly, reducing the spill time from 77 days to 13 days.
However, an independent assessment commissioned by Woodside did not support these claims. Instead, the expert questioned whether the piece of equipment proposed by Woodside — a capping stack — could be deployed in practice, and the time it would likely take to do so.
While Woodside has also claimed that a ‘pyrotechnic shear ram’ would reduce the spill time to as little as 24 hours, the company’s expert noted that this had yet to be ‘used in anger’ and that ‘there remains a risk’ that it fails to function.
Woodside’s alarming track record
Woodside’s stated ability to prevent or control a disaster is undercut by its poor environmental and safety track record. There have been numerous incidents at Woodside’s facilities over the last decade threatening the safety of its workers and the environment. These include:
- Whale calf collision: In August 2023, a tugboat operated by a Woodside contractor hit a whale calf in the Port of Dampier. The incident was only confirmed by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) after media inquiries.
- Explosion at Pluto LNG plant: In May 2023, an explosion forced Woodside to shut down and evacuate its Pluto LNG facility. Woodside was accused by unions of downplaying the incident. Eighteen months later, Woodside was again forced to put Pluto LNG into an emergency shutdown after the control systems failed.
- Oil spill near Ningaloo: In May 2025, Woodside spilled 16,000 litres of ‘hydrocarbons’ into the ocean near World Heritage listed Ningaloo Reef while decommissioning its Griffin facility. Three months later, the government regulator ordered Woodside to stop decommissioning operations at Griffin and nearby Stybarrow following a series of ‘preventable health and safety incidents’ at both sites.
- Oil spill in Cossack field: In 2016, a Woodside oil rig in the Cossack field leaked over 10,500 litres of oil into the ocean due to a degraded seal.
- Northern Endeavour clean-up debacle: Woodside evaded a $362 million decommissioning bill for its Northern Endeavour oil platform in the Timor Sea by offloading it onto a one-person operation. When the buyer went bankrupt, the Federal Government had to step in, eventually putting a levy on offshore oil and gas companies to recover the clean up costs.
- Cost-cutting and corrosion: In 2021, Woodside announced a 30% cut in operating costs, focusing on maintenance, despite repeated warnings from the government regulator about corrosion at its oil and gas facilities. The warnings continued. In July 2023, the regulator blamed Woodside’s ‘inadequate maintenance’ for serious corrosion of the flare bridge and support structure at its North Rankin complex.
- Abandoned infrastructure: Woodside finished extracting oil from the Enfield field in 2018. In 2019, the government regulator ordered Woodside to remove the Nganhurra Riser Turret Mooring (RTM), an 83-metre-long, 2,452 tonne piece of infrastructure. Woodside instead tried to sink the RTM near the World Heritage-listed Ningaloo Reef. After a public outcry, Woodside finally removed the RTM in October 2023.
A lasting legacy for our oceans: Save Scott Reef from Woodside’s pollution
Woodside’s Browse proposal to drill for oil and gas presents unacceptable risks to Scott Reef and the web of life it supports from Western Australia to Indonesia.
Greenpeace Australia Pacific and Environs Kimberley are calling on the WA and Federal Governments to save Scott Reef by rejecting Woodside’s Browse project once and for all.
What you can do
Together, we still have the power to stop Woodside and save Scott Reef.
You can help by:
- Sending an email to Environment Minister Murray Watt and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, calling on them to reject Browse.
- Sharing this story to help more Australians understand what’s at stake.
- Encouraging your friends and family to take action.
Analysis by Greenpeace and Environs Kimberley shows that a severe oil spill at Scott Reef could be the worst in Australian history — Woodside has labeled the impact of such a spill ‘catastrophic’. According to the fossil fuel company the impacts to Scott Reef ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’. Oily pollution could reach as far as the Kimberley coast to the coasts of Indonesia and Timor Leste while endangered marine species live, breed, forage and migrate within the potential disaster zone: whales, seabirds, turtles and other marine life are all at risk.
Woodside’s Browse drilling plans at Scott Reef have been found to pose unacceptable risks to the Western Australian environment once before. To secure their approvals under Federal and Western Australian law, Woodside has modelled a number of possible oil spill scenarios that could result from the Browse project.
GPAP illustration of a ‘worst case’ senario oil spill based on Woodside’s own modeling.
Key Findings
- The most severe Browse scenario would be the worst oil spill in Australian history – up to 30 times bigger than the 2009 Montara oil spill disaster. According to Woodside, the environmental impact of such a spill would be ‘catastrophic’.
- Scott Reef and Sandy Islet could be covered in oily pollution. Woodside has conceded that the impacts to Scott Reef from a major spill ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’.
- A blowout of this scale could see oil washing up on the Western Australian Kimberley Coast, and affect at least nine marine parks, eight reefs, three Indigenous Protected Areas, and several islands in Australian, Indonesian and Timor Leste waters.
- Endangered and vulnerable marine species live, breed, forage and migrate within the potential disaster zone: whales, seabirds, turtles and other marine life are all at risk.
- A Browse oil spill threatens important tourism, diving, surfing and fishing hotspots, with potential ‘long term impacts’ for tourism operators in the Kimberley or visiting Rowley Shoals or Scott Reef.
Browse and Montara: Location and extent in the Timor Sea: GPAP illustration based on maps from ‘The Montara Oil Spill: A 2009 Well Blowout in the Timor Sea’ and a Browse loss of well containment.
Scott Reef: An ancient oceanic reef system
Scott Reef, located around 270 kilometres off the Western Australian Kimberley coast, is one of Australia’s largest oceanic reef systems. Ancient Scott Reef has been thriving for 15 million years, having adapted to changing seas. Today, it is a haven for marine life, providing vital habitat for more than a thousand species, including corals, fish, sharks and rays.
The deep waters surrounding the reef are home to 29 known species of whale and dolphin, including endangered pygmy blue whales, which travel along the Western Australian coast and stop at Scott Reef during their annual migration to forage and feed. The dusky sea snake, also classified as endangered, lives at Scott Reef. Sandy Islet, part of Scott Reef, is a nesting ground for a small population of genetically distinct green sea turtles, a species classified as vulnerable.
If Woodside, Australia’s largest oil and gas company, were to gain approval to drill for gas at Scott Reef, the ecosystem would face a barrage of industrial impacts, including seismic blasting, gas flaring, underwater noise, artificial lighting, pipe- laying, and fast-moving vessels over years of construction and operation. Add to that the risk of a major oil spill that could be Australia’s worst environmental disaster, with consequences spreading far beyond Scott Reef.
GPAP illustration of drilling sights at Scott Reef.
A disaster worse than Montara, according to Woodside itself
Woodside has proposed drilling 50 new wells around Scott Reef to extract oil and gas from beneath the reef as part of the Browse project. Woodside has proposed to build a 900-kilometre-long undersea pipeline to connect the Scott Reef-Browse site with its North West Shelf facility at Karratha in Western Australia, where the gas would be processed, mostly for international export. Woodside has modelled a number of possible oil spill scenarios that could result from the Browse project. Woodside performed this modelling to comply with mandatory environmental impact assessment requirements under Federal and Western Australian laws.
To identify which areas are at risk of an oil spill from the Browse project, Woodside engaged experts to conduct probabilistic modelling. Experts simulated different spills, noting which locations would be contaminated by oil and how much oil would make it to shore. They also assessed how likely each location was to be affected.
” Woodside’s ‘worst case’ scenario is a blowout at the Torosa gasfield, directly under Scott Reef.”
Greenpeace Australia Pacific and Environs Kimberley’s analysis shows an oil spill at Torosa could see 893,739 barrels of condensate spilled into the Timor Sea. This would be up to 30 times bigger than the 2009 Montara oil spill, considered one of Australia’s worst environmental disasters. Oil leaked into the Timor Sea for days after an oil rig caught fire off the Western Australian coast, causing a 90,000 square kilometre oil slick that spread all the way to Indonesia.
People, places and wildlife at risk
Woodside’s modelling shows that an oil spill at Scott Reef could affect eight reefs, at least nine marine parks and three Indigenous Protected Areas. In the event of a worst-case oil spill, Scott Reef and Sandy Islet, being closest to the wellhead, would be worst affected.
Woodside’s modelling finds that the impacts to Scott Reef from a major spill like this ‘would likely be severe and potentially irreversible’. The impacts of an oil spill are not confined to Scott Reef – according to Woodside’s modelling, ‘hydrocarbon spills resulting from the proposed Browse to NWS Project have the potential to significantly impact shoreline habitats at Scott Reef, Ashmore Reef, Cartier Island and Rowley Shoals.’
Oil from a blowout could also reach neighbouring countries, including Pulau Rote, Savu, Sumba and West Timor in Indonesia, and Timor Leste. This is not an exhaustive list of all places that could be affected by an oil spill at Scott Reef. Once oil hits the water, its spread is influenced by the wind, tides, currents and other external conditions. An oil spill from the Browse project could have a less or more severe impact than the modelling indicates. Equally, Woodside cannot rule out other sites being affected.
A disaster for marine life
Woodside’s oil spill modelling shows that a blowout from the Browse project would put whales, turtles, seabirds, coral, significant feedstocks such as plankton and seagrass, fish, dolphins and other marine life at risk. According to Woodside, a Browse oil spill would:
- Directly threaten the coral at Scott Reef, with ‘potential for near total coral mortality in the worst affected areas’; a severe spill could also harm coral at Seringapatam Reef and the Rowley Shoals.
- ‘Significantly impact’ the plankton, seagrass and macroalgae that support the entire food chain.
- ‘Significantly impact bird species, including protected species’, which are ‘particularly vulnerable’ to oil spills.
A spill would not only threaten birds at Scott Reef, but those that nest or breed at Ashmore Reef and Cartier Island, Browse Island, islands along the Kimberley coastline (such as the Lacepede Islands) and Rowley Shoals. Woodside’s oil spill modelling specifically notes the potential risk to thirteen species of seabirds.
Oil spills also threaten whales and other cetaceans, especially concentrations of oil on the surface of the water. This can cause ‘sublethal and lethal effects’, especially when feeding, as whales and other marine mammals have been found to aspirate oil when breathing through an oil slick at the sea surface, thus absorbing hydrocarbons directly into their lungs, leading to sublethal and lethal impacts.
According to Woodside’s modelling, a Browse oil spill could be particularly harmful to the spinner dolphins living at Scott Reef with the potential for ‘a significant portion of this local population to be impacted in the event of a worst-case hydrocarbon spill’.
Marine reptiles, including the green sea turtles found at Scott Reef, are also at risk. Woodside’s modelling warns that an oil spill could cause ‘significant mortality amongst adults and hatchlings’, leading to ‘the potential for longer-term impacts on the Scott Reef – Browse Island genetic stock of green turtles’. Further, an oil spill could have lasting impacts on the breeding populations of olive ridley turtles, flatback turtles and hawksbill turtles. Essentially, all marine life found at or near the sea surface could be impacted by such a spill.
GPAP illustration of pygmy blue whale and humpback whale migration path through Scott Reef and a ‘worst case’ oil spill senario based on Woodside’s own modeling.
Woodside cannot be trusted
In Woodside’s inadequate response plan, Woodside states that it considers an oil spill to be ‘highly unlikely’ and the threat to the environment and wildlife to be ‘acceptable’. We do not believe these are credible assertions. For instance, the WA Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), which is assessing Woodside’s Browse to NWS proposal, did not agree. In August 2024, it emerged that the EPA advised Woodside that its Browse development posed ‘unacceptable’ risks to WA’s environment.
A potential oil spill from the Torosa field was one of the risks cited by the EPA in its preliminary decision not to approve the project. Woodside has subsequently revised its plans to drill for gas at Scott Reef, proposing to use unproven new technology that the company claims would bring a spill under control more quickly, reducing the spill time from 77 days to 13 days.
However, an independent assessment commissioned by Woodside did not support these claims. Instead, the expert questioned whether the piece of equipment proposed by Woodside — a capping stack — could be deployed in practice, and the time it would likely take to do so.
While Woodside has also claimed that a ‘pyrotechnic shear ram’ would reduce the spill time to as little as 24 hours, the company’s expert noted that this had yet to be ‘used in anger’ and that ‘there remains a risk’ that it fails to function.
Woodside’s alarming track record
Woodside’s stated ability to prevent or control a disaster is undercut by its poor environmental and safety track record. There have been numerous incidents at Woodside’s facilities over the last decade threatening the safety of its workers and the environment. These include:
- Whale calf collision: In August 2023, a tugboat operated by a Woodside contractor hit a whale calf in the Port of Dampier. The incident was only confirmed by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) after media inquiries.
- Explosion at Pluto LNG plant: In May 2023, an explosion forced Woodside to shut down and evacuate its Pluto LNG facility. Woodside was accused by unions of downplaying the incident. Eighteen months later, Woodside was again forced to put Pluto LNG into an emergency shutdown after the control systems failed.
- Oil spill near Ningaloo: In May 2025, Woodside spilled 16,000 litres of ‘hydrocarbons’ into the ocean near World Heritage listed Ningaloo Reef while decommissioning its Griffin facility. Three months later, the government regulator ordered Woodside to stop decommissioning operations at Griffin and nearby Stybarrow following a series of ‘preventable health and safety incidents’ at both sites.
- Oil spill in Cossack field: In 2016, a Woodside oil rig in the Cossack field leaked over 10,500 litres of oil into the ocean due to a degraded seal.
- Northern Endeavour clean-up debacle: Woodside evaded a $362 million decommissioning bill for its Northern Endeavour oil platform in the Timor Sea by offloading it onto a one-person operation. When the buyer went bankrupt, the Federal Government had to step in, eventually putting a levy on offshore oil and gas companies to recover the clean up costs.
- Cost-cutting and corrosion: In 2021, Woodside announced a 30% cut in operating costs, focusing on maintenance, despite repeated warnings from the government regulator about corrosion at its oil and gas facilities. The warnings continued. In July 2023, the regulator blamed Woodside’s ‘inadequate maintenance’ for serious corrosion of the flare bridge and support structure at its North Rankin complex.
- Abandoned infrastructure: Woodside finished extracting oil from the Enfield field in 2018. In 2019, the government regulator ordered Woodside to remove the Nganhurra Riser Turret Mooring (RTM), an 83-metre-long, 2,452 tonne piece of infrastructure. Woodside instead tried to sink the RTM near the World Heritage-listed Ningaloo Reef. After a public outcry, Woodside finally removed the RTM in October 2023.
A lasting legacy for our oceans: Save Scott Reef from Woodside’s pollution
Woodside’s Browse proposal to drill for oil and gas presents unacceptable risks to Scott Reef and the web of life it supports from Western Australia to Indonesia.
Greenpeace Australia Pacific and Environs Kimberley are calling on the WA and Federal Governments to save Scott Reef by rejecting Woodside’s Browse project once and for all.
What you can do
Together, we still have the power to stop Woodside and save Scott Reef.
You can help by:
- Sending an email to Environment Minister Murray Watt and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, calling on them to reject Browse.
- Sharing this story to help more Australians understand what’s at stake.
- Encouraging your friends and family to take action.
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