Table of Contents
Joanne Nova
A prize-winning science graduate in molecular biology.
Foreign readers may not be aware of the bunfight for petrol and especially diesel fuel in Australia. Three weeks in, and the energy and exporting giant of coal and gas is unraveling at the seams. Regional towns and some servos are running out, farmers aren’t sure if they will be able to seed this year, and miners are starting to lay off staff. Three weeks.
It could be something to do with forward planning.
While the rest of the world has 90 days’ stockpile, Australia imports 90 per cent of its oil and has about three weeks fuel left. Obviously, our great leaders looked at our remote, low-density island with an economy based on heavy industry and said “who needs diesel”?
David Archibald has spent 50 years around the oil industry and he has a plan
“There are no impediments to Australia becoming completely autarkic in liquids fuel production, and also petrochemical precursors and LPG, and ammonium sulphate for fertiliser.”
– David Archibald
The method as described in The Solution To Our Fuel Crisis has three main parts:
- Australia already produces oil as a byproduct of the North West gas production, but we ship it overseas. Instead we could refine it here and use it.
- We have discovered new oilfields off the NorthWest Shelf – Pavo and Dorado, and must get them producing ‘tomorrow’.
- We have plenty of coal on the East Coast that we could convert to liquid fuel via the Bergius process. He argues that it costs about $95 per barrel, which is currently cheaper than oil.
It was not that long ago we produced three times as much diesel:
It’s amazing what 15 years of climate fog can do to an industry…
David Archibald explains that climate change ideology killed off a perfectly good plant: “An unforced error”.
There used to be an oil refinery run by BP at Kwinana, but that was closed in 2021. It had a capacity of 140,000 barrels per day. It was running at a profit and didn’t need upgrading. At the time, BP was run by a bloke called Bernard Looney, who “became CEO in February 2020 and served until September 2023, during which time he spearheaded a strategic pivot toward renewable energy and set net-zero ambitions”. In effect, the Kwinana refinery was sacrificed on the altar of global warming. As a modern refinery with the ability to handle a range of crude types it would have a replacement cost approaching $6 billion. The WA and federal governments could have stopped the refinery’s closure but they both worship at the same altar of global warming. The nearest refinery is the Viva refinery in Geelong, 3,300 km to the east. …
His story symbolizes the whole downfall of Australian energy policy. We believed the hype on climate change and stopped thinking of fossil fuels as the motor of civilization. We stopped paying attention.
Our big states need a lot of diesel
Queensland and WA use half the national tally of 33 billion litres of diesel.
David Archibald says: 1. Use the oil we already have
The first thing to do to fix our fuel problem is to utilise the oil and condensate we are producing but not refining. Onshore and offshore, Western Australia produces 50,000 barrels of oil and 250,000 barrels of condensate per day. The condensate is a byproduct of gas production for the LNG plants 1,300 km north of Perth.
There used to be an oil refinery run by BP at Kwinana but that was closed in 2021. It had a capacity of 140,000 barrels per day. It was running at a profit and didn’t need upgrading. At the time, BP was run by a bloke called Bernard Looney who “became CEO in February 2020 and served until September 2023, during which time he spearheaded a strategic pivot toward renewable energy and set net-zero ambitions.” In effect, the Kwinana refinery was sacrificed on the altar of global warming. As a modern refinery with the ability to handle a range of crude types it would have a replacement cost approaching $6 billion. The WA and Federal Governments could have stopped the refinery’s closure but they both worship at the same altar of global warming.
2. Open new oil fields:
The next thing to do to secure Australia’s fuel security will be to develop the Pavo oilfield which is located 100km off Port Hedland. This is a 109 million barrel oilfeld discovered in 2022.
The Pavo discovery was preceded by the Dorado discovery in 2018. This is a big field at 162 million barrels of oil (half of Australia’s annual consumption) with 748 BCF of gas…. initial production is still five years away at best.
Australia needs the Pavo oilfield online tomorrow. Pavo is a national security issue now. Pavo is a simple, uncomplicated development. It is in 88 metres of water and has a low gas to oil ratio.
3 .Turn the excess, bountiful coal we have into liquid fuel that we can pour into tanks, trucks and tractors:
The solution for the east coast is installing Bergius coal liquefaction plants.
There is plenty of coal that is too low grade for export, either due to ash content or water content, which would be ideal because it is next to worthless. There was a Japanese research Bergius plant in the Latrobe Valley which operated up to 1991. Victorian brown coal has a high reactivity and thus a low residence time. This Japanese effort determined a price hurdle of US$40 per barrel for development in 1991 dollars (oil was US$24 per barrel at the time). That equates to US$95.20 in 2026 dollars which is less than the current Brent price of US$102 per barrel. To quote a line from the movie Aliens, the readouts are all in the green. There are no impediments to Australia becoming completely autarkic in liquids fuel production, and also petrochemical precursors and LPG, and ammonium sulphate for fertiliser. Well, no impediments apart from the current State and Federal Governments. But those can be overcome by the will of the People once the People have suffered enough to get organised.
Archibald adds that Western Australia could use the Bergius coal process, too:
When the oil and gas fields run out, as they will, liquids production can switch to applying the Bergius liquefaction process to the lignites that exist in a belt from Salmon Gums, north of Ravensthorpe, wrapping around the Yilgarn Craton towards the South Australian border.
A few details about converting coal to liquid fuel:
Coal liquification
The current diesel price in one of the better suburbs of Perth is $2.92 per litre which equates to $464 per barrel, which is US$325 per barrel.
The future is coal liquefaction by the Bergius process. That involve a lot of stainless steel because the Bergius reaction takes place at 300˚C, 250 atmospheres of pressure with hydrogen. Hydrogen causes embrittlement of carbon steel above 200˚C and so stainless steel needs to be used.
How it works is shown in this graphic from Bergius’ Nobel Prize acceptance speech in 1931:
[The] addition of five kg of hydrogen to 100 kg of coal turns it from a low value solid into precious liquids. The hydrogen is made by steam reforming of part of the gas stream. Oil has a specific gravity close to 0.8 so 100 kg of coal converts to 81 kg of oil which has a volume of 100 litres. On that basis, one tonne of good quality coal will convert to 6.3 barrels of oil. Lignites, with a 40 per cent water content, would produce 40 per cent less.
How much stainless steel? A length of stainless steel pipe 50 metres long, 900 mm in diameter and with a wall thickness of 10 mm will allow a one hour residence time to produce 5,000 barrels per day. Learn to weld stainless steel. Everyone needs to do their part.
Read it all How to solve Australia’s fuel crisis.
David Archibald is also the author of The Anticancer Garden in Australia. He has had over 50 years in and out of the oil industry. His first oil industry role was as a juggie on a seismic crew in the Channel Country of far western Queensland in 1974.
