An Italian energy company has quietly revived plans to develop a new gas field in the Timor Sea that contains the most carbon-rich gas in Australia.

Key points:

• The Verus gas field has a very high percentage of CO2 content
• Eni says it can still produce carbon-neutral LNG through carbon capture and storage
• IEEFA says Eni has little room to "bury" emissions if it shares the Santos CCS facility

The Evans Shoal gas field, about 300 kilometers northwest of Darwin, was discovered 35 years ago and has since passed through the hands of BHP Petroleum, Woodside, Shell and Santos. Since 2017, it has been controlled by Eni, an Italian energy company operating in more than 60 countries, which recently renamed the project Verus. The gas in the Verus field has a very high percentage of carbon dioxide — an average of 27 percent, according to Geoscience Australia. "That's far more than any other gas field being developed in Australia," said Kevin Morrison of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). (Daniel Fitzgerald)