Welcome to Barrow Island
By WP BrandStudio, Content from Chevron
Barrow Island is an unusual piece of land. Sitting less than 40 miles off the Pilbara Coast of Western Australia, Barrow hosts the Gorgon Project, a new, technologically advanced liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant operated by Chevron. Gorgon is one of the largest natural gas developments in the world and a crucial driver of economic growth in the Asia Pacific region. The island it calls home is also a Class A nature reserve.
In an effort to safeguard Barrow’s biodiversity, Chevron has implemented a comprehensive conservation management system in parallel with its natural gas project. The system involves more than 300 procedures, checklists, and rules that protect Barrow’s ecosystem from nonindigenous species that could harm it. One technologically-aided procedure, for instance, employs 70 acoustic sensors positioned around the island to detect the distinctive chirp of the non-native Asian house gecko. The rigor works. The protections have managed to successfully maintain biological balance. In fact, since the Gorgon Project began, zero nonindigenous species have been established on the island. The result is that Barrow remains a safehaven for a range of rare species.
Yet Barrow Island’s natural resource bounty extends beyond its biodiversity. It also offers access to an abundance of offshore natural gas, the cleanest-burning fossil fuel. Natural gas currently accounts for 22 percent of the global energy mix, and that market share is steadily on the rise. The growth is being driven by Asia, whose booming economies and developing urban infrastructures require increasing amounts of fuel. Together, Japan, China, and South Korea account for nearly 60 percent of the world’s LNG demand. And regional need is only set to increase in the coming decades as economies in south and southeast Asia continue to mature. Gorgon was built to meet that demand; at full production, the plant will have capacity equivalent to 5 percent of the world’s current LNG supply.
Taken in tandem, Chevron’s commitment on Barrow—both the Gorgon Project and the conservation management system—is a balancing act. Yet it is one that is showcasing how the industry can meet the world’s growing energy needs in an environmentally responsible way.
Learn how natural gas is a growing part of Chevron’s portfolio.
Sources:
1. https://australia.chevron.com/our-businesses/barrow-island/
2. https://www.chevron.com/projects/gorgon
3. https://www.iea.org/topics/naturalgas/
