Sneaky oil drillers - let's stop them

Posted by jamess — 4 February 2011 at 6:42pm - Comments
Hess' own projection of a possible spill. Terrifying.
by. Credit: Greenpeace
Hess' own projection of a possible spill. Terrifying.

The oil companies are at it again: they're trying to drill another deep water well off the Shetland Islands. Let's stop them.

A few months ago we mobilised together to stop Chevron drilling the first deep water oil well in UK waters after the Gulf of Mexico disaster.

We succeeded in delaying the drilling for over a week, and are currently in the middle of legal battle with the government over its plan to allow more new drill permits. The news now is that another US oil company, Hess, wants to work with Chevron to drill at another site in the deep waters off the Shetland Islands, called Cambo 4.

There’s a public consultation open for the next few days - you can help stop the drilling.

You probably remember Anais and Victor scrambling up the anchor chain of the Stena Carron, Chevron’s massive drill ship, followed by the occupation of the chain with the legendary yellow pod. You might even remember our last-ditch efforts to stop the Stena Carron reaching the drill site, jumping in front of the moving ship. Sixteen hours bobbing in front of the steel behemoth has certainly left its impressions on me.

The thousands of emails that you sent to energy secretary Chris Huhne were a huge morale boost for those of us on the Esperanza and also told the government that we don’t want dangerous deepwater drilling in UK waters. Certainly not until we’ve learned the lessons of the Gulf of Mexico.

There’s little doubt in my mind that the government now knows how much pressure we can bring, which is why they’ve done their best to hide the public consultation notice (which they’re legally obliged to publish) in the corner of page 42 of the Independent on 14 January this year (see pic on the right). They also allow people to read the Hess report on the potential environmental impacts of the new well in the Aberdeen and Lerwick public libraries (only between 10am to 4pm on workdays, mind).

Well, they didn’t manage to hide it from us and we’ve dug out the details for you. You can submit your own views on this drilling license to the government and make this consultation truly public.

If there’s a shred of doubt in your mind about the importance of this, take a look at Hess’ own modelling of a possible spill scenario, which has oil choking the coastlines of Ireland, Scotland and reaching as far south as the Norfolk coast. Not to mention spreading as far as Iceland, Germany and even the far north of Norway.

Hess admits that, in a worse-case scenario, a spill at Cambo 4 would be as large as that of the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico. Yet the area around the proposed drill site is home to over 20 species of dolphin and whales, many of which are under threat of extinction. The 48 species of seabird from fulmars to razorbills as well as the otters that live in the area could all be caught up in a spill.

And that’s before we consider the global consequences of continuing to burn oil, from climate refugees to a rapidly melting Arctic.

So please take a minute to make your own submission to the consultation (we’ve even created one for you if you’re in a rush) and tell everyone you know about it. Let’s stop this drilling.

Thanks for all the comments. On whether getting a job with Hess or Chevron is the answer, we've already seen how all the smart kids are looking beyond dirty energy industries for employment.

Regarding oil drilling, the fundamental point here is that we have the choice. This idea that drilling in deeper, more dangerous, more exploitative places is inevitable is ridiculous. We have the ability to decide when risks to our local environment and our global climate are too high and therefore put our efforts elsewhere.

It's true that moving onto cleaner, greener energies will take time (and create lots more jobs by the way), but the point is that we can choose.

My question to all those who stick their heads down and say "let's keep on drilling" is this: when do you want to stop? When we've needlessly destroyed local habitats and driven up global temperatures? When the execs at BP tell you it's time? Or when you - for the sake of your kids and our shared planet - realise we have to mobilise around the alternatives.

We all have incredible power to change the world we live in. The only thing that gets in the way is that pervasive myth that we can't change anything.

That's why that challenge of "stop moaning, do something" etc rings so hollow. It's the people who make up this Greenpeace network who are the ones who 'do'. Maybe some of the doubters out there should try joining.

Thanks for the comments. A little polite reminder: please don't get abusive, it doesn't help the discussion and your comments will be deleted.

Nobody here is arguing that oil is not central to our current way of life. The question is where do you want to go from here. We're saying that continuing along this route of ever-riskier drilling and continuing to burn fossil fuels is dangerous to the local environment and catastrophic for the global climate.

Of course demand is key to addressing the problem, and we campaign on that too. We've long been pressuring governments for strong emissions targets on vehicles across Europe, which will reduce oil demand.

So to those of you criticising this campaign, what are your ideas about oil, do we need to get off it? If so, how? Are you worried about a six-degree rise in global temperatures? If so, what do you suggest doing about it?

We're campaigning for solutions to these problems, but it seems that many people here don't see the problems.

Few more follow-up points to comments above:

Matt Harris was right, BP went through a very high profile rebranding exercise to show themselves as 'green', despite putting negligible resources into clean energy. That's why we ran our own rebranding competition last year, to expose their hypocrisy.

On the map itself, don't forget that's the company's projection of a worst-case scenario spill. It was shocking enough for the Times to publish it on page three. And what makes those of you trust the company's own projections so much anyway? Chevron doubled their spill projection following the Gulf of Mexico disaster. If they change them at the stroke of a pen, shouldn't that alone make you concerned?

Matt Harris' point about changing the investment environment around clean energy is key. It seems that JffRlyr is agreeing when you say the change won't come from the oil companies. Not least if fossil fuel companies enjoy government subsidies that are more than ten times higher those of renewable energy industry.

For more info on our go beyond oil campaign:

http://gobeyondoil.org/now.php
http://gobeyondoil.org/now_oil.php
http://gobeyondoil.org/now_invest.php
http://gobeyondoil.org/now_govt.php
(and many more links at that site..)

If you haven't seen it already, the High Court has given the green light to our legal challenge over deep water drilling in UK waters http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/we-get-green-light-high-court-...

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