We are in the midst of a climate emergency that has been fulled by human activities including production and burning of fossil fuels.

Despite calls from leading scientists and scientific organizations to halt fossil fuel production and switch to a zero carbon society, companies like Woodside have been acting otherwise. Woodside's projects such as the Scarborough LNG project in Western Australia not only contribute to climate change, but also threaten endangered species and First Nations heriatge areas and songlines.

Frustratingly, Monash University have partnered with such an organization to develop the 'Woodside-Monash Energy Partnership' and named the new Building for Technology and Design after Woodside. This is not only paramount to greenwashing but also increases the risks of influencing research outputs.

We are calling on Monash University through this petition to:

1. End their partnership with Woodside in the Energy research partnership. Or at the bare minimum provide transparency around safeguards put in place to prevent research bias.
2. End Woodside's title sponsorship at the Building for Technology and Design.

We are calling on your help to sign this petition to show support. Further reading regarding this petition can be found below.

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The era of global warming has ended and “the era of global boiling has arrived”, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, has said after scientists confirmed July was on track to be the world’s hottest month on record. The world has experienced 1.2 degrees of Global warming compared to pre-industrial times, largely fuelled by the production and combustion of fossil fuels. This has caused large-scale fires, heatwaves, extreme weather events, droughts, and sea level rise impacting millions around the world.

The International Energy Agency has claimed that to limit Global warming to 1.5 degrees, crossing it would likely trigger irreversible catastrophic climate tipping points, the world cannot have any new or expansionary fossil fuel projects. 

Yet, despite calls from leading scientists, a lot of fossil fuel companies are increasing fossil fuel production, including Woodside. Currently, Woodside is investing over US$6bn into an oil field in Senegal and into its Scarborough LNG project in Western Australia, amongst other fossil fuel projects. These figures dwarf their investment in zero-carbon technologies.

The Scarborough LNG project is touted to be part of the most climate-polluting project EVER in Australia! Furthermore, the seismic blast testing as part of this project will devastate the unique marine life along WA's coast including endangered Whale species whose ancient migratory paths are in the area.

The project is also a threat to an irreplaceable First Nation heritage - the Burrup Peninsula Rock Art.  There has been no proper consultation with the Mardudhunera people and the people of the Pilbara and they are unaware of what Woodside are trying to get away with on their traditional lands. 

Now, they are fighting to stop their songlines from being erased. “The Mardudhunera people have had enough,” Raelene Cooper, Mardudhunera cultural Traditional Owner and a board member of the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation, said. 

“We have not been consulted properly, the State Government and Woodside are continuing to progress with this, and the information that has come has been inadequate.”  The project also negatively impacts the 50,000-year-old Murujuga cultural landscape on Western Australia’s Burrup Peninsula due to toxic acid emissions and the production of by-products.

Despite all these negative impacts from fossil fuel production, Monash University has partnered with Woodside. The new Engineering building at the Clayton Campus has been named after Woodside, and Woodside is also the primary partner in the Woodside-Monash Energy partnership. This is could be the equivalent of a cigarette company sponsoring lung cancer research. While the website for the partnership claims to sponsor photovoltaics research alongside Direct Air Capture and Carbon Capture and storage technologies, as of September 2023, there has been not much transparency into how much funding has been provided or the steps being taken to prevent bias in research.

Researchers at Columbia University last year published the first peer-reviewed paper to attempt to quantify the implications of Fossil fuel funding towards University research. The paper was published in the journal 'Nature' (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-022-01521-3 and found that research centers accepting funding from the gas industry were far more likely to embrace fossil gas as a climate solution and to downplay the role renewable energy sources might play in the energy transition than their non-fossil-funded counterparts.

Considering the above mentioned reasons, the Woodside Monash partnership runs contradicotry to Monash University's ambitions to tackle the climate change. This is why we are calling on them to end their pratnership with Woodside.