“Someone got to the Minister”. How fossil politics buried emissions data

Why did the Albanian Government publicly eliminate billions of tons of fossil fuel carbon emissions? Rex Patrick investigates.

There are three types of carbon emissions from industrial-scale projects.

• Scope 1: Direct emissions.
• Scope 2: Supplier emissions (e.g. from electricity, heating or cooling needs)
• Scope 3: Customer emissions

Annual Scope 1 emissions for the recently approved North West Shelf expansions were estimated at 7.7 million tonnes, Scope 2 emissions at 0.002 million tonnes and Scope 3 (from gas flared by overseas customers) at 80 million tonnes (90% of all emissions are scope 3).

During the 50-year extended life of the project, 4 billion tons of scope 3 greenhouse gases will be produced.

Only translucent

When Professor Graeme Samuel AC conducted his review of the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC Act) in 2019/20, he made a recommendation that developers “transparently disclose all emissions from the development” when seeking approval for projects (recommendation 2b). By this he meant Scope 1, 2 and 3.

When Minister Tony Bourke introduced the Environmental Protection Reform Bill 2025 to Parliament on 30 October 2025 on behalf of Minister Murray Watt, something was missing.

Clause 191 of the Bill only required disclosure of a reasonable estimate of the likely amount of the developer’s scope 1 and scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions.

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A riddle wrapped in mystery within a riddle

This led to the following exchange between Senator David Pocock and Deputy Minister Rachel Parry at the Senate Committee hearing examining the bill.

Senator Pocock: Recommendation 2 of the Samuel review included a requirement for ‘all emissions from development to be disclosed transparently’. Your answer in appendix A of your submission is that the supporters will disclose scope 1 and 2 emissions. This is clearly not ‘full emission’ as Professor Samuel recommends. What about Scope 3 emissions? Why aren’t they included?

Miss Parry: This was a decision taken by the government on how emissions would be defined and disclosed as part of this package.

Ms Parry did not answer this question.

It was clear to Senator Pocock and everyone watching the hearing that someone within the Government (Cabinet, the Minister, an official in the Department) had made the decision to exclude scope 3. He was clearly trying to get more out of it.

MWM He made a Freedom of Information (FOI) request seeking access to documents relating to the issue of ‘Scope 3 emissions’ that were sent to Minister Watt’s office during the development of the bill.

No direct answers to Pocock’s questions were found among the 23 documents (2 of which were rejected outright as draft Cabinet documents).

But there was enough information in all the documents to solve something, and these will be released in due course.

An unfaithful partner

MWM must be fair in its reporting.

The government has strategies to reduce emissions, but they all focus directly on what’s happening within Australia’s national borders.

It is doing a lot to transition from energy produced from fossil fuels to renewable energy. It works with State governments and councils to promote the domestic use of clean energy, including the use of electric vehicles, and improve energy efficiency.

It helps in the electrification of the transport sector, the use of a (corruption-proof) system. Australian Carbon Credit The plan in the agricultural sector and forces countries that are large industrial emitters to gradually reduce or offset emissions. Protection Mechanism program.

But the Government is behaving like a disloyal partner

– having a wonderful net zero loving relationship with society from wake up to breakfast, only to then leave home for work only to embark on a nasty emissions event.

There is nothing in legislation or Government policies about Scope 3 emissions. We ship massive amounts of coal and gas, and with that we also bear responsibility for the emissions these fuels produce when burned and converted into energy.

Free to ignore, court rules

They can do this with judicial approval.

in 2016 Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) took Minister Greg Hunt to court over his permit under the EPBC Act for the Carmichael open-cut thermal coal mine in inland Queensland.

ACF argued in part that the mine’s Scope 3 emissions would have an unacceptable impact on the Great Barrier Reef due to rising global temperatures.

ACF’s claims were rejected by the Court. The ACF appealed the decision, focusing only on scope 3 emissions, but the Full Court upheld the primary judge’s decision, stating:

“There may be good reasons to disagree with the Minister’s decision, but this is not an issue that concerns us in an appeal limited to the lawfulness of the decision. We see no justification for the allegation that he failed to take into account the possible effects of overseas emissions on the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, their consequences and their impact on the Reef and protected subjects.”

The government will now exempt scope 3 emissions from being taken into account when assessing development approvals.

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ICJ decision: Australia violated

In July 2025, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued an advisory opinion on the ‘Obligations of States in Relation to Climate Change’, finding that countries have a duty to prevent significant environmental harm in the context of climate change.

This view means that Australia should do everything it can to prevent this harm and therefore has a duty to exercise due diligence when evaluating any fossil fuel project.

Fleur Ramsay, a lawyer specializing in indigenous rights and international environmental law, explained this to the Senate Committee examining reforms to the EPBC Act.

In response to a senator’s question about the approval process for the reform bill, Ms Ramsay told the Committee:

“It would constitute a breach of Australia’s commitments not to consider scope 3,

“Under international law as it currently exists, as the International Court of Justice has explained.”

Regarding the lack of a requirement to disclose a project’s scope 3 emissions, he stated: “Certainly, the lack of information about scope 3 would be a breach at the moment, at least in relation to what the ICJ has said, which is that those emissions belong to Australia – scope 3 belongs to Australia – because coal, gas and oil have no purpose other than to burn them, so that’s part of the act.”

An FOI request made by MWM following the ICJ’s decision while the EPBC reform bill was being drafted showed that the Government had “carefully considered the decision” but had not acted on it (MWM submitted an updated FOI request to see how that evaluation went).

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Why are there no Scope 3 disclosures?

This brings us back to the question of why Scope 3 emissions disclosures are not included in the reform bill.

Certainly, the Department and the Minister were meeting the Scope 3 disclosure requirement. A briefing the department gave to the minister in June 2025 made clear that these needed to be disclosed but advised the minister that they were consulting stakeholders on this matter.

However, in mid-July 2025, the language changed. The summary of talking points moved away from including Scope 3 emissions in the reforms, stating that the minister was open to extending the requirement to scope 3 emissions “if this is possible”.

Someone reached out to the minister.

The only explanation to be seen in the 174-page publication for not including Scope 3 emissions disclosures in the bill is in a document labeled “Overview of priority issues – July 2025”; “Emissions-intensive industrial sectors are likely to oppose any changes that increase the focus on the emissions profiles of projects, particularly in relation to Scope 3 emissions,” this document states.

And we all know that the Government cannot disturb the industry with which it has dealings, especially the fossil fuel industry.

Overview of Priority Issues for July 2025 (Source: FOI)

Rex Patrick is a former South Australian Senator and formerly a submariner in the armed forces. Known as an anti-corruption and transparency warrior, Rex is also known as “Transparency Warrior“