SYDNEY—An indigenous clan on remote islands in northern Australia scored a legal victory against energy giant Santos Ltd., in a case that could have a wide-ranging impact on how resource companies handle relations with traditional landowners.
On Wednesday, an Australian judge threw out a regulator’s approval of Santos’s environmental plan to drill for natural gas in the Barossa gas field, about 85 miles off the coast of the Tiwi Islands near Darwin. The case was brought by Dennis Tipakalippa, an indigenous leader on the islands who argued the regulator shouldn’t have approved the drilling because Santos didn’t properly consult his clan on its impact.
