Federal Labor’s Madeleine King defends gas as ‘critical’ to Australia’s needs
Opposition frontbencher will tell industry Labor’s support is predicated on gas being a transitional fuel during the shift to net zero emissions
The Santos gas plant in Darwin. Labor’s Madeleine King will say the shift to decarbonisation presents a massive economic opportunity for Australia and its commodities, including gas.
Thu 17 Jun 2021 03.30 AEST
Last modified on Thu 17 Jun 2021 09.04 AEST
Labor’s resources spokesperson, Madeleine King, is launching a full-throated defence of Australia’s gas industry, including supporting opening up new reserves “subject to independent scientific assessments and effective environmental regulation”.
King will use a speech to the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association conference in Perth to champion gas jobs, gas exports, gas as “a critical feedstock for Australia’s manufacturing industry, as well as in electricity generation” and the opening up of new reserves, like the Beetaloo basin.
“It is important that people are aware that the Beetaloo is a world-class, low-carbon gas basin – containing about 3% carbon dioxide,” King will tell the conference on Thursday.
She will tell oil and gas executives that the federal Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, will convene a shadow ministry meeting in Port Hedland this month, with the trip “an opportunity for many of my east coast colleagues to see this incredible region for themselves and to listen to the concerns of the resources industry workers who contribute so much to our national wealth”.
“Our message to the people of the Pilbara will be unambiguous: Labor supports the resources sector and the jobs it creates,” King will say. “We support the jobs it creates all over Australia, in our big cities and in our regional towns.”
King will portray her position as a middle course. She will tell the Appea conference people who “care about the future of Australia’s energy sector often find ourselves caught between opposing forces in the toxic climate wars”.
“On one side of this often counterproductive debate are the activists who naively seek to shut down, or rapidly phase out, many of our extractive industries and to demonise all fossil fuels,” she will say.
“At the other extreme are the climate change deniers who have ensured that Australia has become an international outlier in the global drive to reduce carbon emissions.”
Madeleine King will use a speech to the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association conference on Thursday to champion the gas industry. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAP
King will characterise both of those positions as “dangerous and wrong”.
“Both pose a risk to the health of our resources sector and to the critical need to address climate change and therefore our economic prosperity, in coming decades,” King will say.
“The reality is this: the inevitable global transition to net zero emissions presents a massive economic opportunity for Australia and its natural commodities, including natural gas – therefore, good climate policy is good jobs policy”.
Gas is usually described as having about half the carbon dioxide emissions of coal when burned for energy. Studies have suggested its contribution to global heating is greater once methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas that leaks from gas wells, is factored in.
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