An Open letter to Telstra Super on fossil fuel investments, particularly Santos and Woodside Energy

The following email to one of my superannuation funds, Telstra Super, was partly generated from the latest Market Forces Climate Wreckers Report. It is easy to generate a letter with specific information to your Super Fund. I added substantially more contextual information to my email. But a short personal note with reasons on the necessity for divesting for our future can also have an impact. 

Every Super member has an opportunity to change how their superannuation is invested, divesting away from fossil fuels to clean energy solutions.

To TelstraSuper,

Time to End all investments in the world’s worst fossil fuel expanders

I’m contacting you to demand that you end the fossil fuel expansion plans of companies you invest my retirement savings in, and publicly divest from them if this fails.

I have particular concerns that your engagement with Woodside and Santos to adopt a change in business, has failed. These companies are almost entirely dedicated to Fossil fuel production and expansion. Your continued investment of member superannuation money  in these companies under the rubric that you can engage and get them to adopt net zero emissions by 2050 is fatally flawed and is not in keeping with your fiduciary duty to act for members long term behalf.

Australia pushes for Unabated Fossil Fuel Phaseout at COP28, while Australia opens offshore CCS opportunities to expand Fossil gas

Santos Bayu-Undan carbon capture
and storage project 

Australia's Climate and Energy Minister Chris Bowen has been forward in supporting Fossil Fuel Phaseout or phasedown at COP28. But his statements almost always come with a qualifying words: unabated, or abatement. 

On 12th December Bowen said "“Some of the world’s largest economies have now called for a phase out of unabated fossil fuels,” 

On 11th December press conference Bowen said "Where we've come from is of course, we came to this COP with the G7 having agreed to a phase out of unabated fossil fuels in energy systems by 2050, a position that the Umbrella group decided to support which I chair obviously, at the beginning of the negotiations, contrary to an erroneous report I read suggesting the Umbrella group does not support that position, let me make it very clear - the Umbrella group supports the phase out of fossil fuels of energy systems by 2050, that's very important - that group of United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Israel, Ukraine, Tajikistan, Japan, Iceland, and Norway.

Bowen was a little more forthright in the Majlis discussion, saying "We don’t need to phase out fossil fuel emissions, we need to end the use of fossil fuels in our energy systems, with abatement as a backstop and goalkeeper, not as an excuse for delay or inaction,”

It is never explained what abated fossil fuels actually means, but this is likely to entail either carbon offsets or carbon capture and storage, both of which are problematic in different ways and come with large integrity issues.

Sea Dumping bill: Fossil Fuel grand coalition of Labor, Liberal & Nationals pass carbon capture and storage, throwing a lifeline to Fossil Gas expansion

On Monday 13 November a grand coalition of fossil fuel supporting parties: Labor Liberals and Nationals, voted to pass the Sea Dumping Bill without amendment. This is a loophole in the Safeguard Mechanism allowing the Fossil Fuel companies to open up new Fossil Gas projects and putting Australia’s 2030 emissions reduction targets in jeopardy.

Labor has pushed this bill through - Environment Protection (Sea Dumping) Amendment (Using New Technologies to Fight Climate Change) Bill 2023 - rather than enhance the Water Trigger in the existing Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (an election promise), or to add a climate trigger to that Act. Anthony Albanese even proposed a Climate Trigger amendment bill in 2005.

Barossa gas project: Santos appeal to Full Bench of Federal Court dismissed after challenge by traditional owners

Cheers from traditional owners on the Tiwi Islands after the Federal Court Full Bench dismissed an appeal by Santos regarding its Barossa Gas Project in the Northern Territory.

Tiwi Islanders had appealed the start of drilling that they had not been consulted in the project to start drilling off the coast and the installation of a gas pipeline to Darwin to process the gas in the Proposed Darwin LNG plant. 

They won their initial injunction. Santos then appealed to the Full Bench of the Federal Court, which today was dismissed.

Tiwi Islander Dennis Tipakalippa and other Tiwi residents initially launched legal action in June 2022 to halt drilling, fearing it could damage their sea country.

Australia has a pavillion at COP26 and it appears to be a Santos gas and CCS promotion

Photo courtesy Jo Dodds, Bushfire survivors for Climate Action

 I have attended four UN Climate Change conferences and Australia has never had a country pavillion. But at COP26 Australia is there with some big screens, a coffee machine and signs from Santos, one of Australia's biggest gas exploration and production companies.

Santos Tour Down Under stage shortened due to extreme heat, after riders raise heat health concern

First published at nofibs.com.au

Cyclists in the Santos Tour Down Under UCI Professional cycling race in South Australia today faced the challenge of riding in temperatures over 40 degrees. Local temperatures on the road are likely to be even higher for the cyclists riding on hot road surfaces. Indeed, Jérémy Maison with the FDJ team measured a local temperature of 50C with their Garmin cycling computer, according to a tweet.

The stage was from the Adelaide suburb of Unley, through the Adelaide Hills to Lyndoch, in the Barossa Valley.

The race length was revised down from 145km to 118km, a reduction of 26.5km, with the finishing circuit reduced from two laps to just one, after cyclists in the peloton complained about the searing conditions.

The real irony though, is the fact that the major race sponsor is the South Australian based Gas and fracking company Santos, whose whole business revolves around fossil fuel extraction which causes climate change and more extreme temperatures.

Occupation of #Santos #Pilliga #CSG site by traditional owners, local farmers

Santos plans for a Coal seam gas field in the Pilliga region of western NSW has met stiff opposition from local farmers and traditional owners. A Santos test site was occupied on Sunday by 120 people in a mass civil disobedience action.

Santos want to build a waste water treatment plant at the Leewood site near Narrabri. After that they plan to drill over 850 coal seam gas wells to establish a gasfield in the Pilliga Forest. This is the largest undisturbed inland forest left in Eastern Australia.

Locals protest Santos Pillaga CSG expansion

Something is happening in the Pillaga in western NSW. Coal Seam Gas exploration and drilling by Santos is under concerted attack. While the protests are not new, the profiles of those locking on or taking a stand are no longer the regular sterotype.

Yesterday a Coonabarabran mother of three young children, Nicole Hunter, locked on to a bulldozer for several hours. Mrs Hunter attached herself to a bulldozer to stop Santos clearing a patch of the forest for a new coal seam gas drill pad. She had a support crew from Coonabarabran. She was released after several hours without charge.

She is concerned about the industrialisation of the area and the impact on underground water, the mainstay of agriculture and important for recharging the Great Artesian basin. Read the story on CSG is risky business for aquifers.

Coal Seam Gas Field proposal for Pilliga Scrub withdrawn by Santos

The Adelaide headquarted Mining and energy company Santos has withdrawn proposals for development of the Pilliga gas field near Narrabri in north western New South Wales.

Santos took over Eastern Star Gas' assets in the Pilliga Forest in 2011 with the intention of developing 550 duel coal seam gas wells and associated infrastructure. They were vigorously opposed by the local community and activist groups including the Wilderness Society. Conservationists have welcomed the withdrawal but are aware that further proposals may be submitted in future.

The development proposals were withdrawn after a private meeting between Santos and the Federal Government last Friday. All proposed development including the gas field, power plant and major gas pipeline applications, have now been withdrawn.

Tour Down Under sponsor Santos told 'on ya bike' over CSG in the Pilliga

The Santos sponsored Tour Down Under was visited today by anti-CSG activists from the Pilliga Forest near Gunnedah in New South Wales. The protesters on bicycles took their protest to Santos Head Office in Adelaide today. Santos is the major sponsor of the Tour Down Under, so activists such as @thepilligamouse and several koalas hoped on their bikes to ride around Adelaide this morning to protest Santos’s destructive and toxic coal seam gas operations in Eastern Australia’s largest remaining temperate woodland and surrounding farmlands. They were joined by NSW politician and grazier David Quince.

Related: Total Fire Ban exemption for Santos CSG plant riles Pilliga residents

Total Fire Ban exemption for Santos CSG plant riles Pilliga residents

While firefighters were battling over 137 fires across NSW, over 40 uncontrolled, and with a total fire ban in place on Tuesday and Wednesday in record temperatures, Santos Gas at it's Pillaga CSG processing plant were able to vent and burn gas as usual in the middle of a tinder dry forest. Local residents have complained about this exemption saying it poses an unacceptable fire risk for the local community and for the Pilliga forest.

Background: The Global Mail - Pillaging the Pilliga (October 2012)