Woodside has huge plans to drill for oil and gas – and to meet its climate targets. How

The Australian energy giant Woodside is spending $7bn to drill for 479m barrels-worth of oil and gas off the coast of Mexico, but it says this is all in line with keeping global heating to 1.5C.

How?

Woodside has said it “aims to thrive through the energy transition by building a low-cost, lower-carbon, profitable, resilient and diversified portfolio”.

It has a 60% stake in the development, known as Trion, alongside Mexico’s state-owned oil exploration and production company, Pemex.

Pemex discovered the oil and gas 2.5km deep, about 180km off shore in the Gulf of Mexico. There will be 24 wells and Pemex and Woodside are planning for the first oil to be pumped in 2028.

Announcing the investment, Woodside pointed to analysis carried out for the UN’s climate science panel that it said showed there were “a range of future energy transition pathways” that allowed for new supply of fossil fuels while keeping the global temperature rise to 1.5C.

Drilling for all this oil and gas in a new development would not even compromise the company’s climate targets, it said.

But analysts…