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The state is rushing approvals for a decades-long lease of prime land near the Port of Brisbane for a global oil giant as part of the government’s plan to create a self-contained Queensland oil industry.
Speaking on Sunday, Premier David Crisafulli said the government would promise 35 years of security to BP by renewing the global fuel company’s long-term lease on Bulwer Island, enabling it to begin work on upwards of 10 fuel storage tanks.
“Our negotiations with BP had started earlier this year, before this [fuel] crisis, and we wanted to give them that lease certainty so they could invest here,” Crisafulli said.
“That will enable them to refurbish five idle fuel storage tanks, and that will increase their capacity here by around 20 per cent – that’s a big play.”
The premier said the company also had plans to add another five tanks in the medium term, bringing the total capacity to 140 per cent of the current stores – or about 103 million litres.
BP country president Paul Auge said it expected to spend $100 million restoring the five existing tanks – which were decommissioned in 2015 – with a view to reopening them by 2029.
“We’ll start work next year; we’re doing the engineering now,” Auge said.
“Obviously, with this news, we will look to accelerate that as much as possible.”
While the company did not have a timeline for the construction of five additional tanks, Auge said the oil giant has “options already that we can bring to the table to build more tanks”.
“We’ve done a lot of work around the long-term strategy for these assets,” he said.
The premier said over that same medium- to long-term period, he wanted to open up more drilling and refining operations in Queensland, which he said would boost the state’s “sovereign capability” in the fuel space.
“We got to store, we got to drill, we’ve got to refine, and we’ve got to control our own destiny again,” he said.
“We don’t want to be at the begging end of a global supply chain, and this is a moment in time – we can’t miss it.”
Crisafulli said he wanted to see Australia’s 30-day fuel reserves at least doubled by Queensland industry.
Private investors had already come forward on other recently bolstered fossil fuel projects, he said, including mining opportunities in the Taroom Trough, about 300 kilometres north-west of Brisbane.
While on Sunday Crisafulli said the state was delivering security rather than funding, in late April, the government promised $25 million to aid the development of renewable diesel at Ampol’s Lytton refinery, sitting across the river from BP’s Bulwer Island.
On Sunday, the premier also reiterated calls for the Albanese government to grant a national interest exemption for oil exploration, under its Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, for the Taroom Trough project.
“Until we have that dead hand of the EPBC removed, the ability to really get cracking in the Taroom Trough will be hindered,” Crisafulli said.
When asked about the upcoming Stafford byelection, the premier refused to comment, but pointed to the government’s recently released ambulance ramping data.
Queensland Primary Industries Minister Dale Last, however, said the byelection would be a referendum on Steven Miles’ leadership of the Labor Party.
Last said if there wasn’t a significant swing to Labor in the seat – which was held by Labor until former MP Jimmy Sullivan was removed from the party – the opposition leader was “toast”.
“The pressure is back on Steven Miles. It is now up to him to deliver, and if he doesn’t, he’ll be walking a short plank,” Last said.
Labor said voters were not interested in “mud slinging”, as it renewed calls for the state to restore beds it said had been cut at the Prince Charles Hospital.
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