Chevron has "deliberately mismanaged" its carbon sequestration project at the Gorgon gas facility in Western Australia in order to avoid its environmental commitments, a WA conservation group has alleged.

Key points Chevron's Gorgon gas facility on Barrow Island, WA began production in 2016

Chevron's Gorgon gas facility on Barrow Island, WA began production in 2016 Carbon dioxide extracted from the gas was to be sequestered by pumping it more than 800 metres underground, but instead has been released into the atmosphere

Carbon dioxide extracted from the gas was to be sequestered by pumping it more than 800 metres underground, but instead has been released into the atmosphere Conservation groups claim that Chevron never intended for its carbon sequestration to work

The carbon sequestration facility was taxpayer funded to the tune of $60 million under the Low Emissions Technology Development fund, and supposed to begin operation just after the plant began processing gas in 2016.

However a series of technical issues has prevented that from happening.

Chevron only recently applied for a licence to begin operating its carbon sequestration facility on Barrow Island in May of this year, according to Department of Water and Environmental Regulation (DWER) documents.

This delayed licence application is proof the company never intended to begin sequestering carbon in 2016, said Conservation Council of Western Australia (CCWA) spokesperson Piers Verstegen.

Gorgon's first gas exports started in 2016. ( Supplied: Chevron )

"They've left the first step in the process, the part where they seek initial approval, until two years after they were publicly saying they were going to do this," Mr Verstegen said.

"I think there needs to be serious questions raised about the expenditure of that taxpayer money in a situation where this company clearly had no intention to make it work within the timeframes that they agreed to."

Mr Verstegen said he believed sequestration was doomed to fail and that the company was delaying having to provide other carbon offsets, such as tree planting and carbon farming.

The Gorgon gas plant was given approval to operate on the Class-A environment reserve at Barrow Island off the coast of Western Australia on the condition that it would capture and bury — known as sequestering — up to 100 million tonnes of emissions over the life of the project.

A Chevron publication states the project would inject between "...3.4 and 4 million tonnes of reservoir CO2 each year", which totals around 40 per cent of the total emissions from the plant.

Chevron 'confident' injection will start this year

Barrow Island sits about 56 kilometres off the mainland. ( Supplied: Google Earth )

Gas extracted from the surrounding gas fields is currently taken to the Gorgon processing facility on Barrow Island where it is cooled and liquefied ready for transport.

During that liquidification process, CO2 is separated out.

It is then supposed to be pumped more than 800 metres underground where it migrates into the porous rocks.

But so far the carbon dioxide emissions have been released directly to the atmosphere.

Clean Energy Regulator data shows the facility produced over 9 million tonnes of CO2-equivalent emissions for the 2017-18 reporting year, making it Australia's highest CO2 emitting gas facility for that period.

That's more than all the CO2 emissions saved by all the rooftop solar in Australia combined, physicist and climate scientist Bill Hare told the ABC last year.

Chevron has repeatedly missed deadlines to have the sequestration technology up and running, most recently in March this year.

While Chevron did not respond directly to the CCWA's claims, a company spokesperson said they were "confident" that the first sequestration would take place later this year.

"The Gorgon CO2 injection project is believed to be one of the largest greenhouse gas mitigation projects undertaken by industry, which will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the Gorgon project by around 40 per cent," the spokesperson said.

"We are taking the time to start the system carefully and safely as the Gorgon CO2 injection project will run for more than 40 years."

But the CCWA aren't the only ones sceptical of Gorgon's timeline for sequestration.

Richie Merzian from the Australia Institute said the emissions baselines that Chevron has negotiated for the Gorgon project don't take into account successful CO2 sequestration.

Emissions baselines are the amount of CO2-equivalent emissions a company can produce in a year, without having to compensate in carbon credits or other offsets.

"In the emissions baseline they negotiated with the government, it banks in failure," Mr Merzian said.

"It seems like almost every quarter, Chevron have come up with a new excuse to delay the project.

"I think Chevron has a debt to the Australian public both for a project they've failed to deliver, and for their extra emissions in this country."

In April 2018, the WA Environment Minister requested the Environmental Protection Agency look into the implementation of the conditions of the project.

In response to questions from the ABC, both the EPA and DWER said that the inquiry "is ongoing".

WA Environment Minister Stephen Dawson told the ABC he has requested the inquiry in order to "determine a clearly defined start point for the commencement of the five-year rolling average".

"I understand Chevron has applied to the Department of Water and Environmental Regulation for a licence amendment to allow for the operation of the carbon dioxide injection system," the Minister's statement said.

EPA initially warned against the project going ahead

Barrow Island is a class-A nature reserve. ( Supplied: Kane Ditchfield )

Barrow Island sits 56 kilometres off the West Australian coast roughly in line with Karratha, and is home to dozens of species found nowhere else on Earth.

It's a refuge for golden bandicoots, Barrow Island euros, spectacled hare-wallabies and other native mammals hit hard by cats and foxes on the mainland.

The island is under the control of American-owned energy-giant Chevron and apart from the workers on the Gorgon project, Australians aren't allowed to set foot on the island.

Golden bandicoots are among a number of rare and unique species on Barrow Island. ( Supplied: Colleen Sims, Parks and Wildlife )

In the mid-2000s the WA Environmental Protection Agency pushed back against the application to build the project on Barrow Island, according to Peter Newman of Curtin University.

"I was in the Premier's office at the time and the EPA were saying they should not go to this island, this is not right to develop on an A-class reserve, this is sacrosanct you know, we don't do that in Western Australia," Professor Newman told the ABC.

"[But] cabinet overrode them."

An EPA report from 2006 recommended the facility not go ahead because, "the overall impacts of the project would be environmentally unacceptable".

As well as the potential impacts to the island's flora and fauna, the report noted that there would need to be "a scheme designed to inject a high percentage of the reservoir CO2, or implement alternative measures to abate the equivalent amount of reservoir CO2 vented to the atmosphere".

Around this period, Chevron brought a representative out from the US who made promises that the company have since broken, Professor Newman said.

"They brought out their big, high-flying pinch-hitter. His name was Chuck, that's all I remember, Chuck from Houston, and boy did he chuck his weight around," he said.

"He was very, very strong, and at the end of that he walked home having achieved a very good result for Chevron and they got what they wanted."

The company appeared to be very confident at the time that they could get the sequestration technology to work, according to Professor Newman.

"The whole reason for being allowed to go on an A-Class reserve (Barrow Island) was because the sediments were perfect for this sequestration," he said.

"So I don't know, I just don't understand. What is the big difficulty? That is the question to ask them."

While Chevron would not provide specific details on technical problems that have delayed the project, it has previously been reported that rusting pipes have been an issue.

Carbon sequestration is not a new technology, and has been successfully used around the world since the 1970s, according to David Byers, CEO of emissions capture and storage research group CO2CRC.

While Mr Byers is not associated with the Gorgon project and could not comment specifically, he said there was a general feeling in the industry that Chevron would resolve its technical issues.

He also said that carbon sequestration has an important role to play in emissions reduction in Australia.

"The thing about carbon capture and storage is that it has a number of applications across a number of different industry sectors...oil and gas, power generation, but also things like steelmaking processes," he said.

"Australia actually has some of the best storage basins around the world."