Gorgon CCS Project: An Independent View of Why the Asia Pacific Flagship CCS Project is Not a Carbon Storage Issue

Abstract Operational since August 2019, the Gorgon Carbon, Capture and Storage (CCS) project in the Australian Northwest Shelf, has pioneered the large-scale implementation of CCS in the Asia Pacific region. The project sees the separation of the CO2 from the natural gas feed of the Gorgon LNG plant, one of the world’s largest natural gas projects, and its injection in the saline aquifer of the Dupuy Formation, 2km below the surface. The project has been estimated to store to date over 12 Mt of CO2. The late start of the CO2 injection program, injection rates below targets, and complexity in treatment of produced water from the regional aquifer and injection of the water into shallower formation have contributed higher cost and to a degree scepticism in media of the Gorgon CCS project. This fueled anti-CCS sentiment and made new investors in the emerging sector question the effectiveness of CCS technologies. But what underlies the project's challenges to deliver on its promise of being the Asia Pacific's flagship CCS project? We provide an overview of some of the causes behind the challenges encountered to date. Based on published public data, we independently discuss the issues encountered by the project during development and operation. We highlight that these issues primarily relate to risk and pressure management of the recipient reservoir of the produced water from Dupuy formation, rather than the selected technologies for capture, transport, injection, and storage. The pioneering Gorgon CCS project has been a CCS success, instilling confidence in new investors in the APAC CCS sector. It demonstrates that the necessary technologies are available, reliable, and can be successfully implemented. In mid-2024, Chevron took a Final Investment Decision on measures to address the shortfall in CO2 injection.