Clean-up rules

The Australian federal parliament has passed a law that will force oil and gas producers to pay for the cost of decommissioning offshore rigs. Keith Pitt, federal minister for Resources and Water, said the cost of removing offshore rigs from the ocean would be about AUS$43 billion in the next 30 years. Under the new Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Amendment Bill, the government gains call-back powers to force previous owners of an asset to pay for decommissioning if the current owner cannot. The law also creates a trailing liability for energy giants, which applies retrospectively from 1 January 2021.