Newsmaker

Woodside Petroleum Ltd has appointed Michael Chaney as an independent, non-executive director on the company’s board. Mr Chaney is chairman of the National Australia Bank Limited and Gresham Partners Holdings Limited and president of the Business Council of Australia. Next month he will become chancellor of the University of Western Australia. Mr Chaney started his working life as a petroleum geologist on the North West Shelf Venture with Woodside-Burmah Oil NL, a forerunner of today’s Woodside Petroleum Ltd., and was engaged in the oil exploration industry in Australia, the United States and Indonesia for eight years. In 1983 Mr Chaney joined Wesfarmers and was managing director for 13 years from 1992 until his retirement in July 2005. He was a director of BHP (and subsequently BHP Billiton) for 10 years until his retirement in November of this year. Mr Chaney has a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Western Australia. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia in 2004.