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Mining billionaire Andrew Forrest has focused his fossil fuel fury on LNG giant Woodside and its boss Meg O’Neill in an extraordinary radio interview during which he accused her of being trained by liars and of “peddling poison”.
Woodside hit back, describing the Fortescue chairman’s comments as “personal vitriol” that set a terrible language for public debate and should be condemned.
Fortescue chair Andrew Forrest at COP28 in Dubai.Credit: Sean Gallup/Getty
Speaking on Perth talkback station 6PR’s Mornings program, Forrest doubled down on comments made on the sidelines of COP28 published by the ABC, where he said fossil fuel bosses’ heads should be “put on spikes”.
He then went further, firing broadsides directly at O’Neill and her history prior to Woodside as an ExxonMobil executive.
“You’ve raised Meg, let’s talk about Meg. Meg is hard-edge trained by the biggest liar we’ve ever seen around climate change over the last 40 years, and that’s ExxonMobil,” he told presenter Gary Adshead.
“She’s been parachuted in here, bringing in all ExxonMobil’s ways.
“I’m simply saying can we please look at the fact that Meg is driving an agenda to get carbon bombs going as quickly as possible.”
Forrest then turned his attention to WA Premier Roger Cook, rubbishing his recent comments that the state’s emissions would rise from fossil fuel projects like Woodside’s Scarborough to help the rest of the world decarbonise.
The Fortescue chair said Cook was a good premier, but urged him to stand up to O’Neill and ask her: “Why are you peddling poison all the time?”
“Roger, get up and speak to the troops, mate. Find out if they’re really happy that you’re peddling an energy that’s going to poison the kids,” Forrest said.
Forrest’s comments come as Fortescue launches a nationwide media campaign attacking the fossil fuel sector.
The interview was recorded before Woodside and Santos confirmed late Thursday that they were in merger talks to possibly form an Australian fossil fuel giant.
Forrest conceded his “heads-on-spikes” comment was “colourful”, but backed the language in the face of rapidly rising global temperatures and populations facing lethal humidity.
“[Fossil fuel companies] know that. They’re just up here just pretending it’s not happening and so that’s why I made that inflammatory remark,” he said.
“Now that you know, you are responsible.”
Referring to the heads on spikes comment a Woodside spokeswoman said it was extremely disappointing that Forrest used violent imagery in his attack on petroleum industry leaders and “has now resorted to personal vitriol” during his interview.
“Such language sets a terrible example for public debate and should be condemned,” he said.
“It also has the potential to turn community sentiment against the urgent actions required to achieve the energy transition.
“We can only solve the pressing global challenge of climate change through respectful discourse and genuine collaboration and cooperation across industry, governments and communities.”
During his Friday morning interview Forrest also attacked carbon capture and storage technology, which has been touted as a major solution to help decarbonise Australia’s major gas projects but so far has not worked as promised at scale.
He said oil and gas companies spent more money “capturing politicians” rather than carbon.
“Carbon sequestration is just an old lie waiting for the next idiot to come along. It’s been failing dismally for 50 years,” he said.
“As a statistician, I’ve got to say, mate, I mean, when it failed 19 out of 20 times you can’t call it a solution.
“You don’t give a dying patient a medicine which is likely to fail, you give them a medicine which is likely to work.”
Forrest turned to the level of tax Woodside paid, referring to the ATO’s latest company tax report that put Fortescue third on the list of the biggest taxpayers in the nation and Woodside Energy Group at 58.
“Why aren’t they anywhere near the top 10? Taxpayers putting money back into the pocket of the public, why is it left to companies like Fortescue the third-largest taxpayer in Australia?” he said.
Woodside disputed Forrest’s analysis of the ATO’s report, pointing out that its total company tax bill was split across three entities that paid a total of $558 million in 2021-22 which would make it the 21st largest taxpayer in the country.
In a tax transparency report last month, Woodside said it had paid $3.7 billion in taxes and royalties to federal and state governments in the first half of 2023.
Premier Roger Cook said he wanted to “stop the name-calling” around gas and reiterated that countries burning coal for energy would need gas to decarbonise.
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