Woodside sets aside $5 billion to help transition to cleaner energies

Australia's LNG giant Woodside is planning to invest $5 billion by 2030 in diversifying its portfolio to include "new energy products" as part of the global trend of decarbonising, the company said Dec. 8 in an investor update.

"Our customers, investors and other stakeholders are increasingly demanding low cost, lower carbon energy," Woodside's CEO and managing director Meg O'Neill said at the update. "We are working on further improving the way we do things to make sure we are 'match fit' for the challenge ahead."

The company's target of investing $5 billion plans to encapsulate by the mid-2020s the start-up of new energy projects, scale-up of carbon offset projects, ammonia exports from Australia, development of carbon capture and utilization opportunities, and the progression of carbon capture and storage opportunities.

Woodside also sees itself exporting liquid hydrogen after 2030.

The new energy opportunities include H2Perth, which is initially targeting approximately 111,000 mt/year of hydrogen production and a future capacity of up to about 550,000 mt/year of hydrogen for export in the form of ammonia and liquid hydrogen.

For the heavy transport sector, Woodside plans H2OK in Oklahoma which would ramp up from around 33,000 mt/year of liquid hydrogen to 65,000 mt/year. A final investment decision for the project is slated for the second half of next year.

There's also a renewable hydrogen H2TAS project which could eventually see up to 1.7 GW of electrolysis and has completed studies with potential customers for ammonia export to Japan. Woodside also plans to begin executing the Heliogen solar project next year.

O'Neill noted that they expect LNG to remain "an important part" of the energy mix in the region for decades to come.