Australian taxpayers on the hook to pay Chevron more than $500m to clean up oil wells

An aerial view of the northern end of Barrow Island, Western Australia. Taxpayers will provide more than $500m for capping hundreds of oil wells and remediating contaminated sites under a 1980s agreement. Photograph: Bill Hatto/AAP

The Australian government faces having to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to the American oil and gas company Chevron to help it clean up oil wells on Barrow Island, in Western Australia, under a deal made in the 1980s.

The Western Australian government also faces a hefty bill – estimated to be $129m – to help repair an offshore nature reserve where about 900 wells have been drilled over the past six decades.