Legal update
Beetaloo fracking hearing day 2
Court summary
When: 9:30am, Tuesday June 24
Where: Federal Court, Sydney (184 Phillip St, Sydney)
Lock the Gate’s Beetaloo fracking case has generated considerable public interest. These legal updates provide factual information about the hearing before the Federal Court that commenced on 23 June 2025.
Day 2
Objections (continued)
As outlined in yesterday’s update, objections to evidence are assertions by one party that material relied on by another party as evidence ought not be received by the Court because it is contrary to legal rules aimed at ensuring a fair hearing.
This morning, after hearing from counsel for both parties, the following outcomes were reached:
- Lock the Gate’s counsel clarified that certain parts of the expert evidence it had filed were not ‘read’ onto the record in court (meaning they are not relied upon by Lock the Gate)
- Tamboran B2’s counsel clarified that objections it had raised yesterday regarding the expertise of one of the experts engaged by Lock the Gate were no longer pressed; and
- Justice Owens ruled on the admissibility of one piece of evidence that was objected to by Lock the Gate. His Honour decided not to admit into evidence a document filed by Tamboran, namely a submission prepared by Santos for the purposes of a public inquiry into hydraulic fracturing in the NT. In addition, parts of the expert report that relied on the Santos submission were also ruled as inadmissible. His Honour observed that there is a difference between material published in peer reviewed journals ‘for the purpose of, you might call it, broadly the advancement of human knowledge’, compared with a submission made by a company to a government inquiry, ‘presumably for the advancement’ of that company’s ‘commercial purposes’.
Lay evidence
Next, the Court heard from the only lay witness in the proceeding, the Chief Operating Officer of Tamboran Resources, Mr Faron Thibodeaux.
Under cross-examination by James Hutton SC for Lock the Gate, Mr Thibodeaux gave evidence on the status of the activities Tamboran is undertaking and the future activities it plans to undertake at the Shenandoah South project site.
Mr Thibodeaux confirmed a number of statements made by the company in publicly available documents and gave evidence that:
- Tamboran has entered into a 15.5 year gas sale agreement with the Northern Territory government for the sale of gas from the Shenandoah South fracking project, and has entered into binding agreements with a pipeline company for the transport of gas;
- The number of gas wells needed to meet the supply obligations under the contract with the NT government may exceed the number of wells presently approved under the current NT approval for the pilot project, and it’s possible the wells could – as a matter of physical capacity - produce gas for at least 20 years.
- The final investment decision for the project is yet to be made but this is a ‘formality’. Although Mr Thibodeux acknowledged the applicable NT regulatory environment and that ‘anything is possible’, he confirmed Tamboran’s intention is to move forward with the whole project (including commercial production of wells, gas compression facility and pipeline).
Expert evidence begins
In the final part of today’s hearing, the expert evidence got underway with an expert evidence ‘conclave’. The Court began to hear concurrent evidence from the following independent experts:
- Professor Matthew Currell, hydrogeology expert – engaged by Lock the Gate
- Mr Andrew Moser, hydrogeology expert – engaged by Tamboran
- Mr Bernard McCloskey, petroleum engineering expert – engaged by Lock the Gate
- Mr Bradley Stout, petroleum engineering expert – engaged by Tamboran
After each expert was sworn in, the hydrogeology experts answered questions to assist the Court to understand the hydrogeological context. Their evidence covered the nature of the groundwater resources in the Northern Territory, the Gum Ridge Aquifer's qualities and importance, and the geology of the region and the project site.
The hearing was adjourned at lunch time, to resume at 9.30 am AEST 25 June 2025 when the Court will continue hearing from the four expert witnesses concurrently.
