Woodside at the top of the energy transition

Woodside Energy is all about thriving through the energy transition by supplying affordable, reliable and lower carbon energy to a world that needs it.

“Woodside has a high quality global portfolio with low cost and high margin operating assets,” said Woodside chief executive officer Meg O’Neill.

Woodside is executing three major projects: Sangomar in Senegal, Scarborough in Australia and Trion in Mexico.

According to O’Neill, the combination of the strong base business and these new investments will generate strong future cash flows and returns for our shareholders across the price cycle.

“The world’s demand for Woodside’s products is expected to be resilient in the coming decades as populations and economies grow, with our target markets in Asia driving primary energy demand,” she said.

“Woodside’s strategy is value focused and underpinned by our disciplined approach to capital management.

“We have both organic and inorganic growth opportunities that we are looking to progress and in new energy, we’re aiming to develop projects that we can scale up in line with customer demand.

According to O’Neill, Woodside’s balance sheet remains strongly positioned to deliver both growth and returns.

The company maintained its dividend payout ratio at 80 per cent in the first half of this year and have now returned a total of $6.3 billion to shareholders since its merger with BHP Petroleum.

“The recent sell down of a 10 per cent non-operating interest in Scarborough to LNG Japan demonstrated the value of the project to our customers,” O’Neill said.

According to her, once operational, Scarborough would be among the lowest carbon intensity sources of LNG when delivered into north Asia.

Execution of Scarborough is progressing, with construction of the floating production unit 50 per cent complete and fabrication of the subsea flowlines and trunkline complete.

Fabrication of the Pluto Train 2 modules in Indonesia and site works in Karratha are progressing well.

“We continue to engage with the offshore regulator and other stakeholders to progress secondary environmental approvals in support of our targeted first LNG cargo in 2026,” O’Neill said.

“Over the course of 2023, Woodside has refined a pathway to our Scope 1 and 2 net zero aspiration by 2050, including cumulative design and operate out emissions reductions totalling approximately 28 million tonnes.

“We are progressing large scale abatement technologies, aiming to reduce the cost of future decarbonisation opportunities.”

In new energy, Woodside targeting hydrogen, ammonia and emerging fuels production leveraging Woodside’s core capabilities.

“We are building a portfolio of offshore carbon capture and storage (CCS) opportunities with the view to decarbonising our base business and offering this as a service to customers,” O’Neill said, which “ have the potential to store more than 3 million tonnes per annum of carbon dioxide by 2030.”