The New Daily readers overwhelmingly support a push by the Greens and crossbench MPs to impose a 25 per cent levy on gas exports.

In a reader poll Wednesday – which received more than 3100 votes – 91 per cent of TND readers said they were in favour of taxing gas exporters.

The TND figures come after polling by the Australia Institute similarly showed most Australians back a flat 25 per cent tax on gas exports.

Australia’s fossil fuel industry is gearing up for a fight over tax as the government mulls changes ahead of its May budget.

The Australia Institute chief economist Greg Jericho explains why the gas lobbyist arguments don’t stack up.

The gas industry is clearly worried that a vast majority of Australians believe there should be a 25 per cent tax on its exports.

After decades of playing Australian governments for fools, the industry deserves to be worried that Australians and politicians across multiple parties have realised that Big Gas is Taking the P–s.

In response to Australia Institute research that shows that, had the Albanese government introduced a 25 per cent tax on gas exports when it came to office in 2022, it would have raised $64 billion in revenue, the gas industry’s lobby group, Australian Energy Producers, has come out with all its old lines.

Its problem is that these lines have never stood up to scrutiny. Even worse, Australians now can see just how pathetically lame they are.

Last Friday, AEP CEO Samantha McCulloch said a 25 per cent tax on gas exports would: “Stop investment in new gas supply, leading to gas shortfalls, higher energy prices, and the closure of Australian industries that rely on reliable and affordable gas.”

Sorry, but no.

1. There is absolutely no danger of Australia running out of gas

Australia has stonks of gas. Absolute stonks of it. There is a reason Australia, along with the US and Qatar, is one of the biggest exporters of LNG in the world – we have stonks of gas.

Australia has so much gas that 83 per cent of all of its production here is exported or converted into liquefied natural gas.

The size of our LNG exports is so huge that more gas is used to covert gas to LNG than by our entire manufacturing industry.

2. Australia does not need ‘more gas’

Australia not only has more than enough gas to meet Australians’ needs, the government’s own figures in its 2024 Future Gas Strategy show that – even when you count all the gas contracted for export out to 2050 – there is more than enough capacity to meet our domestic needs for the future.

As Australia Institute research found in 2024, the suggestion that “more gas-fired generation capacity is needed to facilitate the transition to a renewable grid, and that more gas production is required to address potential shortfalls … is not supported by the government’s own modelling – or the Future Gas Strategy itself”.

3. Don’t worry, the gas industry will continue to invest in Australia

Despite Australia Institute research, and government figures showing that Australia doesn’t need more gas, we know the industry wants to be able to drill for more gas to export even more for massive profit.

A 25 per cent export tax will not kill investment in the gas industry. The tax is modest relative to the taxation of oil and gas in Norway and Qatar – places where those industries have thrived.

The gas is here. Companies cannot move their plants elsewhere, as can be the case with manufacturing.

As the past month has shown, Australia is a good place to invest in gas: It is safe, secure, and with stable shipping routes.

Gas companies will continue to want to invest. The government should not approve more gas mines because we don’t need more gas and it is terrible for the climate.

But fears that a 25 per cent export tax will end the industry are so silly as to be barely worth refuting.

4. No, Australians will not pay even higher prices

Australians are already paying high prices for gas – all because of those same exports the industry profits from.

Since the Gladstone LNG terminal opened in 2015, the domestic gas market has been linked to the world gas price.

This – as the Australia Institute warned back in 2014 – led directly to higher gas and electricity prices:

A 25 per cent export tax will not change the world gas price. In addition, because it is a tax only on exports, it cannot increase the price Australians pay, because tax on gas we use will not change.

Conclusion

It is unfortunate for the gas industry and its lobbyists that Australians are realising that we are not getting a fair return on the massive profits companies are making – especially during times of crisis such as we see now.

But their talking points are just regurgitations of an old gaslighting strategy.

We know the industry does not want to produce gas for Australians.

Back in 2023, McCulloch told a Senate committee that we shouldn’t even really count the LNG exported from Queensland as part of Australia’s gas supply because “that gas was produced in large part because of plans to access the export market. Essentially, it wouldn’t have been produced without that export market there”.

All the industry wants to do is to drill for more gas and export it overseas for massive profits.

Australians deserve a fair return for profits made from our natural resources. Once they are gone, we don’t get another chance.

When exports rise, Australians should expect to receive more tax revenue – this is what happens in Norway, Qatar and other oil and gas exporting nations. 

But in Australia, as LNG exports have soared, the Petroleum Resources Rent Tax has actually fallen.

The gas industry can complain all it likes, but Australians know they deserve better. A 25 per cent tax on gas exports would finally deliver a fair return to Australians for our resources.

The article first appeared in The Point. Read the original here