Wednesday 8 April: New Market Forces analysis reveals Australia’s second biggest oil and gas company, Santos, is contributing to nearly quadrupled gas prices on the East Coast of the country by prioritising the sale of its fossil fuels overseas, adding to cost of living pressures.
The research report – Santos: A Risk Financiers Can’t Afford – has also found that Santos has paid just $33 million in corporate income tax over the past 10 years, just 0.08% of the $41 billion in revenue it earned from its Australian operations.
The research finds that Santos’ massive oil and gas expansion strategy is at odds with climate science and the Paris Agreement. Since 1991 Santos’ oil and gas operations have released greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to running Australia’s largest coal-fired power plant for 70 years.
Kyle Robertson, Head of Research, Market Forces said:
“Santos is fuelling catastrophic climate change and the huge rise in Australian household gas prices, all while sending the country’s gas overseas for bigger profits.”
“It’s absurd that while many Australians are counting the cost of living pressures and recovering from severe floods and bushfires, Santos is pushing ahead with gas expansion that threatens more environmental and economic damage.”
The report shows that there is no room for new oil and gas fields in a world aiming to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius according to scientists and experts including the International Energy Agency and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Due to the company’s expansion plans, the report confirms Santos faces widespread opposition from a number of Tiwi, Larrakia and Gomeroi Traditional Owners, investors, shareholders, farmers, local communities, human rights groups and environmental organisations. This criticism has exposed Santos’ financiers, including Australian and international banks and Australia’s top 20 superannuation funds, to human rights complaints.
The analysis reveals Santos is pushing ahead with its Beetaloo Basin development, a massive new LNG export project. Santos’ fracking operations alone could release the equivalent of more than 12 years of the Northern Territory’s total emissions.
Santos is also steaming ahead with the controversial Papua LNG project in Papua New Guinea, along with other major polluters ExxonMobil and TotalEnergies. Twenty nine banks and credit agencies have ruled out funding the project, including Australia’s big four, Commonwealth Bank, NAB, ANZ and Westpac.
The report recommends that Australian and international banks refrain from providing new finance to Santos for as long as it is pursuing oil and gas expansion projects, due to the inherent social licence, greenwashing, climate, financial, regulatory and legal risks involved. Institutional investors are urged to engage with Santos to align its business with the goals of the Paris Agreement.
The analysis finds that Australia’s top 30 superannuation funds including Australian Retirement Trust, HESTA and Colonial First State, have nearly $5.5 billion invested in Santos and are failing to hold the company to account for expanding oil and gas, which threatens global climate goals.
“Enough is enough, major super funds like HESTA and Australian Retirement Trust must end the greenwashing and live up to their climate commitments by demanding Santos provide a credible business plan aligned with limiting global warming to 1.5°C.”
“Banks which are still backing Santos, including ANZ and Westpac, need to rule out any further finance for this oil and gas company unless it develops a credible climate transition plan,” said Mr Robertson.
For media inquiries and interviews contact:
Antony Balmain, +61-423-253-477 [email protected]
Note to Editor
According to deals published in financial subscription sources, current major lenders to Santos include ANZ, Westpac, NAB, Mizuho, MUFG, SMBC, Citigroup, Royal Bank of Canada, Goldman Sachs, China Construction Bank, Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China, ICBC, Deutsche Bank, ING, DNB, DBS, UOB, Intesa Sanpaolo, and State Bank of India.
Key Findings and Data
- Santos continues to prioritise liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, contributing to a near quadrupling of gas prices on Australia’s East Coast since 2015, based on data from the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO). The average price from 2008 to 2014 was $3.4/GJ, while the average price in 2025 was $12.7/GJ. Since 2000, Australia’s LNG exports have exploded, increasing more than 10 times (935%).
- Over the past eight years, Santos’ Gladstone LNG (GLNG) export facility in Queensland drained more than eight times more gas for export (1,274 PJ) than the 155 Petajoules (PJ) it sold into the domestic market, according to the ACCC.
- LNG remains highly volatile with Asian LNG prices increasing by 26 times from 2020 lows to 2022 highs. This extreme volatility contributed to energy crises in countries currently dependent on imported gas, including Bangladesh, Vietnam and Pakistan, raising questions of Santos’ Asian LNG demand growth claims. Pakistan, for example, has accelerated its shift to renewable energy, cancelling 21 LNG cargoes from Eni and 24 cargoes from Qatar, while importing nearly $1 billion of batteries and over $7 billion of solar panels over the past five years.
- The analysis reveals that Santos’ customers in Japan and South Korea would face total costs of $32 billion to capture, return and store the carbon dioxide (CO2) produced from the Barossa gas project near Darwin back to Australia, based on carbon transport cost estimates from Wood Mackenzie. The cost of locking away this CO2 represents more than 10 times the capital costs Santos spent building the Barossa project.
- Market Forces analysis finds Santos paid just $33 million in corporate income tax in Australia over the past 10 years, despite earning over $41 billion in revenue from its Australian operations. The corporate income tax paid by Santos is equivalent to just 0.08% of total realised sales revenues.
- Since 1991 Santos’ emissions (scope 1-3) totalled 947Mt of CO2-e – (Figure calculated by adding Carbon Majors, Santos 2025 emissions). This is equivalent to running Australia’s largest coal-fired power plant for 70 years (Eraring FY25 scope 1 emissions).
- Santos is actively trying to grow its oil and gas production by between 15-38% over the next five years, despite there being no room for new oil and gas developments in a world in which global warming is limited to 1.5°C in line with the Paris Agreement. Santos’ oil and gas production growth estimates to 2030 are higher than the global growth rates projected under a pathway aligned with 3°C of warming (the International Energy Agency’s current policy settings (CPS) scenario).
– ENDS