Australia’s biggest industrial gas users pump out about 5% of our greenhouse gas emissions. To have any chance of reaching our emissions targets, Australia need to reduce its heavy reliance on fossil gas.

But to make this possible, we need to produce supplies of green hydrogen – made with renewable energy – and biomethane. On current trends, we won’t have enough.

Despite allocating billions of dollars to support green hydrogen, Australia’s policies don’t seem to be working.

The risk is many large factories will either miss their emissions reduction targets by huge margins, or shut down. To prevent this, the federal government needs to foster these crucial green gas industries.

The use of gas in Australia has already peaked in all sectors. In our new report, my co-authors and I show:

the use of gas for electricity generation has fallen 11% since 2014

gas use in manufacturing has been falling since the early 2000s

LNG exports also likely peaked in 2022.

As Australia continues its transition towards a “net zero” energy system by 2050, all of its gas emissions will need to cease.

Industrial gas users burn gas as a fuel for high-heat processes, such as refining alumina or manufacturing, as well as using the gas molecules to manufacture chemical products, like ammonia.

Food processors, beer brewers and other........

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