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The Gulf of Oil

Venice, LA – I’m down at the oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico or what for now is the Gulf of Mexico.  Rick Steiner, a marine conservationist and oil spill expert flew over the gulf Wednesday morning and said,...

“What the hell did we do to deserve this?”

“What the hell did we do to deserve this?” is the question, baby-faced BP CEO Tony Hayward apparently asked his stunned fellow BP executives as they saw billions wiped off the company’s share price due to the Gulf of Mexico...

BP’s “Silent Running” Slips Up Over Slick

In BP’s magazine last year a senior company executive bragged that the company was focussed on "operational excellence" and “silent running”. “Silent Running” was a new concept within the global oil giant.  The final years of Lord Browne’s reign were...

“Drill, Baby, Drill” Means “Kill, Baby, Kill”

Has Obama morphed into President Bush? We were used to Bush strutting his stuff before glistening US military hard-ware, but Obama seems to have followed suit. In pictures reminiscent of Bush, yesterday Obama made an announcement in front of a...

Welcome to Canada’s AvaTAR Sands

For all you romantic film-buffs out there, this week-end’s Oscars is a fight between an ex-husband and wife partnership: James Cameron’s Avatar and Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt locker. Those rooting for Avatar include a collation of 50 Indigenous and environmental...

Yet More Criticism of Shell’s Nigerian Operations

Yesterday it was internal criticism of Shell’s Nigerian operations. Today it is external criticism. A new report by the Ecumenical Council for Corporate Responsibility (ECCR) argues that Shell can improve its negative social and environmental impacts in the Niger Delta....

Shell Employees Attack its “Repugnant” Behaviour in Nigeria

Having written about Shell in Nigeria for over fifteen years, we have known that there was huge internal disquiet about the company’s operations in the country. In the aftermath of the murder of Nigerian writer Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995, Shell...

Groups Fight “Irresponsible Shell” in the Arctic

The Chukchi Sea stand-off between environmental and Alaska Native groups and Shell has taken another twist, with a new legal action to stop the oil company’s plans to drill in the region next summer. Yesterday’s challenge was filed in the...

21 years later oil still pollutes Prince William Sound

For those of you who have not seen the film the Age of Stupid, Pete Postlethwaite, puts in a great performance as a despairing  archivist wondering how we allowed the world to be ravaged by climate change. You could imagine...

Shell Tells Senate: You are Hypocrites

We are used to calling Big Oil hypocrites, saying one thing and doing something completely different. But yesterday, it was their turn to stick the label on the politicians during an influential Senate hearing into the emotive subject of off-shore...