The Environmental Defenders Office will be forced to pay more than $9 million to Santos for its failed attempt to stop the company’s giant gas Barossa project in the Northern Territory after the Federal Court ruled against the taxpayer-funded, climate-focused legal service.

But the EDO will not have to disclose who funded its litigation of Santos, which delayed the $5.8 billion Barossa project. The ASX-listed oil and gas giant wanted the organisation to say who had bankrolled it.