We take steps to minimise environmental impacts on local ecosystems. This includes habitat restoration and careful monitoring to assist compliance with environmental regulations. We include measures to protect groundwater and minimise usage through recycling and advanced management techniques.
Santos has established protocols and technologies to prevent spills and require swift responses to any incidents that could impact the environment. Additionally, the company takes proactive corrective actions to drive continuous improvement in environmental management practices.
Our approach
Santos has a comprehensive approach to management of environmental risks. We are committed to minimising the environmental impacts of our operations and activities, and to work with our communities and partners for positive environmental outcome.
Environmental management is integrated into the Santos Management System (SMS). The SMS applies to all of Santos’ people and establishes the requirements for how Santos does business across our assets and functional support teams. The SMS establishes a structured framework of policies, standards, procedures and supporting tools for the organisation to achieve its objectives and manage its risks effectively and efficiently and is aligned to ISO 14001, the internationally recognised standard for environmental management systems.
Santos’ Environment, Health and Safety Policy establishes our commitments and actions to prevent harm to the environment. The Policy ensures environmental management is integrated in the way we work and that environmental considerations are included in our business planning and decision-making processes. The Policy applies to all of Santos’s operating sites and is implemented through inductions and training to all of Santos’ people and with suppliers and contractors.
The SMS defines the minimum environmental standards that the business must achieve across a range of aspects including:
- Waste management
- Water sourcing and management
- Biodiversity management, including pest plant and animal management
- Land, seabed and benthic habitat disturbance and rehabilitation
- Discharges to the environment
- Air and noise emissions, and
- Artificial light emissions.
The Environment Management Technical Standard, and supporting procedures, processes and tools, detail the technical requirements or specifications that must be achieved in a consistent manner. Key elements include:
- Risk management
- Compliance
- Management of joint ventures
- Management of contractors and suppliers
- Assurance
- Monitoring and reporting, and
- Continuous improvement
The SMS undergoes periodic internal audit assessments on a risk basis. Santos has three layers assurance:
Level 1: site level checks and inspections, including environment workplace inspections
Level 2: site and regional level processes, including environmental assurance plans
Level 3: independent assurance of the region or function being assured, including functional assurance of Environment Management Technical Standard requirements across business activities.
Awareness of environmental risks and controls is maintained across all regions and all levels of the business via regular leadership meetings, environmental professional forums and general awareness programs communicated broadly.
Material topics
We have developed a structured approach to the closure and decommissioning of assets, reflecting best practices in environmental management, safety and community engagement.
Our approach
Our approach is to have a decommissioning plan that addresses our obligations, including regulatory and sustainability requirements. We have a set of standards embedded in our SMS that govern the decommissioning of the oil and gas assets where we operate. These standards enable us to fulfill our environmental and social obligations during decommissioning.
Repurposing of assets is also part of our broader commitment to sustainability and responsible resource management.
Read more on risks and opportunities, our process and due diligence and our actions and performance in the 2024 Annual Report.
Santos is dedicated to sustainably managing impacts to water resources from our activities. We do this through continuing to understand our water-related risks and applying the water management hierarchy across all our operations.
Our approach
Our activities seek to avoid and reduce water abstraction by ensuring operations maximise efficiency and avoid unnecessary consumption. When oil and gas is produced to the surface it is accompanied by water, known as produced water. Our aim is to maximise the reuse of this produced water.
Beneficially using produced water minimises dependency on other water sources and avoids residual water volumes that need to be otherwise managed, reducing costs and impacts across the full operating lifecycle.
Santos manages water-related risks and has identified opportunities to maximise re-use of water. Santos manages co-produced water responsibly and only releases water to the environment in accordance with strict operating conditions that minimises the potential risk of impact to an acceptable level.
Consistent with our responsible management of water, Santos is committed to managing and reducing effluents as a result of our operations. Santos monitors and measures effluent and other discharges in accordance with approved environmental monitoring plans.
In Australia, we are reducing our impact on community water resources by funding initiatives to return water to the Great Artesian Basin (GAB).
Read more on risks and opportunities, our process and due diligence and our actions and performance in the 2024 Annual Report.
Santos works across a broad range of terrestrial and marine environments from tropical and arid to polar biomes, each with its own unique and dynamic biodiversity. We aim to minimise our impact wherever possible.
Our approach
We implement structured development processes that follow an avoidance hierarchy (avoid, minimise and offset) to prevent and/or minimise our impacts on nature. We work collaboratively with our stakeholders to achieve positive biodiversity outcomes. Where we cannot avoid a biodiversity impact, we offset these impacts by protecting larger areas with similar biodiversity values.
We are committed to leaving a positive legacy by enhancing and sustaining biodiversity in our areas of operation and supply chain.
Read more on risks and opportunities, our process and due diligence and our actions and performance in the 2024 Annual Report.
Important topics
Our approach
Our activities seek to avoid and reduce air emissions to prevent or minimise our impacts on nature. We acknowledge the importance of managing air quality impacts associated with nitrogen oxides (NOₓ) and sulfur oxides (SOₓ), volatile organic compounds (VOC) and particulate matter in the context of our operations and projects.
For information on our approach and management of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, refer to the Climate Report.
Our process and due diligence
Santos has robust environment management standards that outline our minimum mandatory requirements. Aligned to the plan-do-check-act cycle in the ISO 14001 Environmental Management System Standard, the environment standards form an integral part of the Santos Management System to manage risks and minimise harm to the environment. These are monitored and assured by our integrated assurance program to check for compliance, effectiveness and continuous improvement.
Santos conducts air impact and risk assessments across new and existing operational sites in line with regulatory requirements. This includes air dispersion modelling to assess potential impacts of air emissions. We monitor and control air emissions from our activities ensuring that emissions remain within legally required limits.
Key initiatives include:
- Emission control technologies
- Monitoring and reporting
- Operational efficiency and innovation
These initiatives reflect Santos’ commitment to responsible environmental stewardship and its efforts to minimise operations air emissions environmental impact.
Our air quality data can be found in the Santos Sustainability Data Book.
Our approach
Waste management continues to be a focus throughout all operations via the implementation of long-term strategies that focus on the life cycle management of waste. As recycling and waste recovery programs advance, Santos’ actions have focused on diverting waste from landfill.
Our process and due diligence
Continued application of the waste hierarchy has been key to the improvement of waste management at each asset. In recent years Santos has executed the waste management procurement strategy, engaging Cleanaway Waste Management as our key waste management service provider in the Cooper Basin and Eastern Queensland and North West Alliance in Western Australia.
In 2024, of the total waste generated in Australia, [65 per cent] was Diverted from Disposal (90 per cent in 2023 and 70 per cent in 2022).
Additionally, for waste considered hazardous, approximately [68 per cent] was Diverted from Disposal globally.
Key programs and initiatives include:
- Improving waste management in Papua New Guinea continues to be a main focus. Key to this is continuing to focus on waste avoidance including reduction of packaging, further source segregation, and on-site treatment and reuse, including enhanced biodegradation of organics in the HotRot.[1]
- As we continue to advance our Pikka Phase 1 Project, initiatives to minimise the generation of waste continue to be explored, including beneficial reuse of materials generated during drilling and development activities.
Our waste data can be found in the Santos Databook.
[1] Global Composting Solutions Ltd (HotRot) is a New Zealand-based business providing waste treatment solutions for customers with complex organic waste streams. HotRot designs, builds, installs and commissions integrated Organic Waste Treatment Plants around the proprietary HotRot Technology