We conduct public interest financial analysis on the most profound economic transformation since the industrial revolution: the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy.

The withdrawal is another blow to the technology, which has so far failed to live up to its hype, partly because the financial incentives to use CCS are not strong enough. “It’s only going to work if the economics justify it and the engineering can be done,” says Climate Energy Finance director Tim Buckley. “I think CCS could work at the wellhead, but you need a high price.” He points to Chevron’s $3 billion CCS system set up to capture carbon dioxide from the Gorgon gas field, offshore from Western Australia, as an example. Read more

Climate Energy Finance director Tim Buckley has previously pointed to Chevron’s Gorgon CCS project as an example of underperformance. Despite more than $3 billion in investment, the facility captured approximately 1.6 million tons of CO2 equivalent in 2024, well below its design capacity. Under Australia’s Safeguard Mechanism reforms, large emitters such as Inpex are now required to progressively reduce emissions. Inpex reported emissions of 6.7 million tons of CO2 in the year to June 2024, just below its regulatory baseline. Read more

Climate Energy Finance founder and director Tim Buckley said the decision to extend Eraring’s closure reflected a “total failure of planning by Origin”. “Origin Energy has failed to build any replacement generation capacity despite knowing for decades Eraring is due for closure,” Buckley said. “But the reality is that the permanent sustainable solution is to build distributed and utility scale renewable energy firmed by batteries at speed and scale, ignoring the small but noisy minority trying to hold back the energy system transformation. “We need permanent solutions—new capacity—at speed and scale, not yet more bandaids on unreliable end-of-life coal plant clunkers.” Read more