{"id":336303,"date":"2025-12-09T03:35:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T03:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/336303\/"},"modified":"2025-12-09T03:35:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T03:35:11","slug":"beetaloo-basin-gas-piped-north-to-keep-the-lights-on-in-nt-from-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/336303\/","title":{"rendered":"Beetaloo Basin gas piped north to ‘keep the lights on’ in NT from 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Northern Territory government is hailing a new agreement which will see fracked gas flow into the NT energy market as a deal that will “save the territory”.<\/p>\n

The gas agreement has been signed between the NT government and gas company Beetaloo Energy Australia, with the firm saying it envisages the gas will flow from mid-2026.<\/p>\n

It comes days after NT Deputy Chief Minister Gerard Maley raised concerns of a gas shortage across the territory, triggered because of cyclone damage to the NT’s main gas facility, Blacktip.<\/p>\n

Territorians urged to prepare for rolling blackouts<\/a><\/p>\n

Territorians are being urged to prepare for the possibility of rolling blackouts, after damaging winds from ex-Tropical Cyclone Fina forced the shutdown of the NT’s main gas supply.<\/p>\n

He said the shortage could lead to rolling blackouts<\/a> affecting Top End properties this season.<\/p>\n

“The Beetaloo is going to be the place that’s going to save the territory,” Mr Maley said.<\/p>\n

“It’s going to literally keep the lights on in the Northern Territory.”<\/p>\n

The cost to taxpayers for the gas to be piped north by Beetaloo Energy Australia is unclear, with the contracts remaining secret under commercial and cabinet-in-confidence agreements.<\/p>\n

Gas to be piped to NT before export<\/p>\n

It is also not clear exactly how much gas will be extracted specifically for the NT, as the company also plans to eventually send gas to the Australian east coast and overseas.<\/p>\n

Beetaloo Energy’s managing director, Alex Underwood, said the company’s first gas would stay in the NT.<\/p>\n

“We are focused on delivering gas into the NT market first, because this gas belongs to the people of the Northern Territory,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n

An agreement was signed between the NT government and company Beetaloo Energy Australia. (ABC News: Matt Garrick)<\/p>\n

The company said the gas that had been committed to flow into the Northern Territory market was previously pegged to be “flared” \u2014 a testing process undertaken by gas firms.<\/p>\n

“It doesn’t actually increase risk, I would argue it reduces the environmental impact,” Mr Underwood said.<\/p>\n

Environment Centre NT released a statement shortly after the announcement, saying it was “dismayed” by the deal which it claimed put the NT’s water supply “at risk”.<\/p>\n

The agreement marks a milestone for the fracking industry in the NT.<\/p>\n

The industry has for years faced environmental protests and a lengthy moratorium.<\/p>\n

The ban on fracking was lifted by the previous NT Labor government<\/a> in 2018.<\/p>\n

Mr Underwood said the new agreement would also pave the way for the company to start construction on the Carpentaria Gas Plant to process gas for use in the NT market.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Northern Territory government is hailing a new agreement which will see fracked gas flow into the NT…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":336304,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,63,148661,99,187408,11053,77269],"class_list":["post-336303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-beetaloo-basin","tag-business","tag-domestic-gas-supply","tag-gas","tag-northern-territory-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/336304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}