26 April 2024 - To: Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water

To meet the capacity requirements, the federal government should consider expanding the CIS or ensuring that New South Wales (NSW)’s commitments to install 12GW of renewables are counted as additional to the federal government’s 23GW.1 IEEFA has also suggested further initiatives to ensure the success of the CIS in our recent submission to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment. [...] In previous research we have argued that: “Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is an expensive and unproven technology that distracts from global decarbonisation efforts while allowing the oil and gas industry to conduct business as usual.”66 Australia hosts one of the best examples of the underperformance and near irrelevance of the CCS efforts through the Gorgon CCS facility, which is part of the p. [...] In the fiscal year to 30 June 2023, the Gorgon CCS injected just 34% of the 5 million tonnes (Mt) of CO2 it captured in the 12-month period.67 The table below illustrates the significant underperformance of the Gorgon CCS venture. [...] None of the Scope Two emissions are required to be abated through the CCS, which means around a fifth of the Scope One and Two emissions at Gorgon was abated in the CCS in the 2022-23. [...] Alternative gases should be reserved for highest-value end uses IEEFA is of the view that green hydrogen has a role in the energy transition and that its use should be focused the most economical use of the fuel given the resources required to produce it.