Perth, March 29, 2026, 23:03 (AWST)
Woodside Energy Group said on Sunday that Tropical Cyclone Narelle was still interrupting production at its Karratha gas plant, while the stock ended Friday up 0.26% at A$34.47 on the Australian Securities Exchange. The outage comes as damage at nearby Chevron facilities points to a deeper regional squeeze in liquefied natural gas, or LNG, which is gas chilled into liquid form for shipping. 1
Why this matters now is simple. Australia is carrying more weight in LNG markets after Qatar shut production this month following Iranian strikes, and MST Marquee analyst Saul Kavonic said the cyclone outage and the Middle East shock together have disrupted more than a quarter of global LNG supply. 1
Woodside said the interruption continued at Karratha, the onshore processing hub for the North West Shelf project, a four-train export system that can produce 14.3 million tonnes a year. The company said North West Shelf output should restart once it can move workers back to offshore facilities, while Macedon and Pluto were operating normally. 2
Pressure elsewhere in Western Australia has made that outage more important. Chevron said on Sunday it would need several weeks to restore full output at Wheatstone after storm damage, even though Gorgon had returned to full rates, while Santos earlier shut Darwin LNG for equipment work and said its Varanus Island gas plant also tripped as Narelle passed. 1
“This will exacerbate gas market tightness in Asia and Europe,” Kavonic said. Jefferies analyst Mike Wilson said “the gas price ramp has been the most important takeaway for markets,” while Josh Runciman of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis said the Australian shut-ins came at “the worst time” for buyers trying to replace Qatari cargoes. 3
The home-market move was modest, but U.S.-listed Woodside shares were at $24.78 late Friday, up 97 cents, as Brent crude rose 4.22% to settle at $112.57 a barrel. That price move kept LNG producers on investors’ radar even as broader equity markets turned lower. 4
But the setup is not clean. Woodside only fully benefits from higher gas and oil prices if North West Shelf comes back quickly, and the logistics picture is still messy: Port of Dampier reopened on Saturday, but general cargo imports remained suspended after inspections found significant damage. Reuters also reported this week that LNG stocks could face increased volatility after their sharp rally. 2
For investors, the next hard markers are the timing of Woodside’s workforce return to offshore facilities and whether Chevron’s Wheatstone repairs drag beyond “several weeks.” Until those dates firm up, Woodside’s near-term story is being set by a tighter global LNG market and interrupted output at home. 1
