Environment

One of the world’s greatest challenges is the requirement to meet growing energy needs, while at the same time reducing carbon dioxide emissions and minimising environmental impacts. AWE is committed to good environmental management and stewardship. AWE acknowledges that oil and gas operations can impact biodiversity, air, water and people. Which is why we understand the importance of informing our stakeholders of our environmental performance.

AWE’s core business is the exploration for and production of oil and gas in Australia, New Zealand, USA and Indonesia. Our operated and non-operated activities are based in environments ranging from the pristine waters offshore New Zealand, Western Australia and Indonesia, to onshore locations in farmland and semi-arid areas in the North Perth Basin and in Texas, USA. Our environmental management approach takes into account this diversity of locations and the associated range of environmental risks.

Our key environmental focus areas for the 2011-12 reporting period were:

• Ensuring minimal environmental impact during the exploration drilling at Atlas-1 offshore in Indonesia Ensuring ongoing planning and preparation was focused on minimising any impacts from our hydraulic fracture stimulation activities in the North Perth Basin

  
  
• Improving the environmental management of our assets
• Putting in place processes to reduce our Greenhouse Gas (“GHG”) emissions
• Reducing the occurrence of environmental spills and incidents

ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT

At AWE, environmental management is integrated with the operational safety, energy efficiency and health management of the organisation. In 2012-13 AWE will review its environmental management systems and reporting framework to identify opportunities for improvement. AWE currently reports on hydrocarbon spills and GHG emissions from our operated activities as well as on an equity share basis from both operated and non-operated assets. In doing so, we believe that we provide our stakeholders with a complete view of the environmental performance across all of AWE’s assets.

CLIMATE CHANGE

AWE is committed to the accurate and transparent reporting of its greenhouse gas measurements to both the government and the market. We provide the market with this information through participation in the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and to the Australian government through its Online System for Comprehensive Activity Reporting (OSCAR) tool.

The Australian Government’s Clean Energy Act (CEA) was enacted during the 2012 financial year, which provides for the levy of a ‘carbon’ charge on GHG emissions from Australian operations that exceed the emission threshold set under the legislation. Two of AWE’s assets are expected to incur a CEA ‘carbon’ charge in 2012-13. In New Zealand, our Tui project is already subject to similar legislation and has been a participant in an emissions trading scheme since 2011.

AWE will continue its commitment to identifying, evaluating and implementing further opportunities to reduce our GHG footprint. Read more...