After Woodside

Here in Australia Woodside's North West Shelf gas extension in Western Australia just got the green light. Despite Labor’s fervent assurances that they really want climate action, this extension locks in fossil gas extraction until 2070 and guarantees up to 4.3 billion additional tons of emissions.

We live in world of double-speak. Labor says they are taking action on climate. But Labor also approves massive gas extensions.

So given that the politics is a wash out, what should climate activists do now?

To answer that question, let's look at what Australian climate activists have actually tried against Woodside and other major gas companies in the past—and most importantly, what actually worked.

What we’ve tried against Woodside before

Our database of 2,240 environmental campaigns reveals 32 separate campaigns targeting Woodside over the past two decades. There’s also been many campaigns against other giant fossil fuel projects in Western Australia. These campaigns blur and merge and shift and change all the time of course, and only show the public face of advocacy and not all the hard work that’s gone on behind the scenes.

But even so, the results offer a sobering lesson about different strategic approaches. In particular, they tell us a lot about whether direct resistance tactics - like blockades - could work in such remote locations.

Here’s just a few examples:

• The James Price Point Success Story: The clearest victory came at James Price Point near Broome, WA, where sustained opposition from 2008-2018 ultimately led to the proposed gas hub (with primary proponents Woodside, Shell, BP, MIMI Browse, and PetroChina) being cancelled. Multiple groups including Environs Kimberley and the Wilderness Society ran coordinated campaigns that achieved a high degree of success. But this wasn’t just because of blockades or other similar forms of direct resistance—this campaign also combined legal challenges, cultural heritage protection, and Indigenous-led resistance.

• The Scarborough Pattern: More recent efforts against Woodside's Scarborough gas project (2021-2024) tell a different story. Despite campaigns by 350.org Perth, Conservation Council of WA, and Extinction Rebellion WA, these achieved delays and discussion, but not an ultimate ban. This project - a separate, new offshore development will produce natural gas with the possibility of feeding into the existing NWS infrastructure - is now going ahead.

• The Disrupt Burrup Hub Exception: One recent campaign in this suite of campaigns targeting Woodside stands out—Disrupt Burrup Hub (2023-2025). While this group and its namesake campaign haven’t stopped the project or the extension, has generated a huge amount of media coverage. Maybe not all media coverage is good … that’s a debate for another day … but it really put the story on the national agenda. After the Four Corners episode and widespread outrage about over-policing and the cosy relationships between corporations and the state, Disrupt Burrup Hub’s efforts show positive results against Woodside. Notably, this wasn't a traditional blockade but instead city-based advocacy focused on undermining Woodside’s social licence through sustained pressure.

The Santos reality check

Our database also shows a huge diversity of responses to gas proposals around the rest of the country. There are over 20 distinct campaigns targeting Santos over the past 15 years, for example, and the track record is sobering:

• Narrabri Coal Seam Gas: Multiple campaigns from 2016-2024 by Lock the Gate Alliance, CSG Free North West NSW, and others. Wilderness Society campaigned from 2015-2018 to stop Santos drilling in the Pilliga. What was the result? The project was approved and is now operating.

• Barossa Gas: Environment Centre NT's campaign (2021-2024) to stop the Barossa project was also recently unsuccessful. With many other groups also advocating against this project, and unsuccessful proceedings by EDO on behalf of three Tiwi Island claimants, this 270m carbon bomb project approval was a devastating decision.

The pattern seems pretty clear: direct opposition to approved Santos projects has struggled to stop them once they have government backing and financing.

What other approaches have worked?

While direct opposition has struggled, some alternative approaches have achieved partial success:

• Financial campaigns: Market Forces' campaigns targeting superannuation funds achieved some success when they focused on divestment rather than trying to stop specific projects. The "Santos" divestment campaign (2022-2023) and "Out of line Out of time" super fund campaign (2019-2023) both achieved some goals, although not enough to sway Santos’ commitment to gas.

• Broader policy campaigns: Several campaigns targeting the "Dirty Dozen" polluters (including Woodside and Santos) through the Safeguard Mechanism partially achieved some positive outcomes by focusing on regulatory frameworks rather than individual projects. In some areas such as the Lake Eyre Basin, sustained lobbying helped deliver commitments from the Queensland State Government to ban fracking in the Basin.

However, the ebbs and flows experienced by many anti-gas campaigns show the risk in depending on policy change. For example, the ‘Protect the Bight’ campaign won some commitments to stop gas exploration in the Bight, but not yet a complete ban, and the PEP11 fight won a ban on gas exploration and seismic testing in offshore NSW, then had it overturned in 2023, then secured it again in 2025.

If anything, these experiences show that pro-fossil fuel policy takes a long time to die, and constant pressure is required to stop these projects arising, zombie-like, over and over and over again in the future.

The blockade reality

Looking specifically at blockade tactics against major fossil fuel companies, our data reveals a harsh truth: pure blockade strategies against approved projects have had limited success in stopping them.

Of the campaigns we identified using some form of blockade tactics against Woodside, Santos, BP, Chevron, and Shell, most achieved small outcomes at best, and the companies charged on ahead regardless. The James Price Point campaign succeeded, but it began before final approvals, alongside multiple other strategies, and in the face of commercial imperatives that also may have sunk the project over time.

But this is not the case for all campaigns against all corporate targets. The anti-coal campaigns and anti-logging campaigns have a wealth of inspirational successes to look up to. It may just be that right now, at this point in time, we are at the apex of gas industry power. We may simply be witnessing the peak of the gas industry's influence. While they wield considerable power now, their dominance may be more fragile than it appears. Gas is on borrowed time, and every advocacy tool we deploy brings us closer to accelerating its decline. The sooner we hit that stop button, the better for our planet and communities.

Campaign outcomes: The reality check

Our data suggests three strategic lessons for responding to the North West Shelf extension:

1. Legal and cultural heritage challenges: Perhaps the most promising near-term approach may be legal challenges focusing on cultural heritage protections for the Murujuga rock art. This mirrors the successful elements of the James Price Point campaign, and also builds on substantial public awareness about this precious slice of Australian history.

2. Financial and investor pressure: Campaigns targeting Woodside's investors, banks, and insurance providers have shown more success than direct project opposition. With at least 40 groups in our database now pursuing legal strategies and growing pressure on fossil fuel financing, this approach has institutional momentum.

3. Building the alternative faster: This shift toward building alternatives reflects the broader movement adaptation we're seeing across the sector. The most strategic question may not be "how do we stop this project?" but "how do we accelerate clean energy deployment so quickly that Woodside's extension becomes economically unviable?" And of course, how can we make sure renewable energy is rolled out in a way that helps, not hinders, the communities that protect it.

The uncomfortable truth

The data tells an uncomfortable truth: once major gas projects have full government approval and financing, traditional opposition tactics face significant limitations. Woodside is Australia's top gas producer with massive resources and institutional support. Their gas plant sits in one of the most remote and challenging environments on Earth—a place that's already dangerous in normal summers, let alone in our climate-changed reality where extreme heat is becoming the norm.

But here's what the data also shows: the movement has already begun adapting. Rather than just saying "no," activists are building the "yes"—the renewable alternatives that make fossil gas economically and politically obsolete. Legal challenges are mounting, with 40 groups now pursuing court cases as a core strategy. Financial pressure campaigns have shown measurable success when blockades haven't.

James Price Point was stopped. Adani's proposed mega-coal mine was delayed for years. But those campaigns began before final approvals in different political contexts. Today's challenge requires different tools—and the movement is already using them.

The question isn't whether we should oppose the Woodside extension. The question is how we oppose it most effectively. Our data suggests a dual approach: pull out all the legal stops to challenge the project while accelerating the renewable transition that will make gas infrastructure a stranded asset.

The irony is that Woodside's 40-year timeline may be its weakness. In a world moving toward net zero, betting on gas until 2070 increasingly looks like a losing proposition. Our job is to make sure it loses faster.