PETROCULTURES AND ANTIPODEAN PLACES

Perth, WA’s capital (population of 2,200,000 in the metro area, 2023), is for some, a very comfortable place to live, deriving wealth from iron ore and fossil fuels. It is routinely claimed to be the world’s most isolated capital city. Yet, it is also a vital gateway to Southeast Asia, given its location on the Indian Ocean Rim – geographically part of the southern hemisphere but economically or politically at the margins of “the West”. Perth, like the rest of Western Australia, and much of the nation, is the product of colonial history, implicated in dispossession and marginalisation of First Nations peoples. Today, the city is home to major players in energy and resources industries and their State-wide cultural and environmental impacts, wrapped in narratives of green, blue, and grey energy transitions.

Major sources of oil in WA were first developed in 1953 and the first commercial quantities of natural gas sourced in 1966. Since then, the State has become so dependent on the fossil fuel sector (including natural gas) that shifts to a more sustainable and less destructive energy culture have been slow and often resisted. In addition, the growth of a ‘Fly In, Fly Out’ (FIFO) employment culture has significantly altered communities in the State’s north while attracting large numbers of workers to hitherto unheard-of levels of income. Coal is still mined in all of Australia’s States, with the largest export docks in Queensland and New South Wales. Yet, the eastern States have taken the lead over WA in decentralising renewable energy structures. In Indian Ocean Rim countries, demand for coal, oil, and gas has been growing exponentially, with the two former largest oil producers – Indonesia and Malaysia, out of an oil history going back to the late 19th century – now becoming net importers. Just energy futures are contested there too, albeit based on different legacies and distinct place-based, culturally meaningful visions for dignified living.