Chevron’s Massive Natural Gas Refineries Destroying Sea Turtle and Whale Habitat in Sacred Aboriginal Country
San Francisco — The new Chevron Alternative Annual Report released today in advance of the company’s annual shareholder meeting May 25 in San Ramon, Calif., exposes the deadly impacts to indigenous lands and endangered sea turtle and whales from California-based Chevron’s massive new natural gas refineries in Northwest Australia. Read more and download the report at www.seaturtles.org
Turtle Island Restoration Network (TIRN) of Marin County, California, and its allies in Australia are calling on Chevron to quit its partnership in the proposed new Browse Basin liquid natural gas (LNG) refinery, pipeline and port that will cut across sea turtle migration and humpback whale calving waters in the spectacular and undeveloped Kimberly region of Northwest Australia. Chevron should also halt expansion of the Gorgon LNG project now being constructed on top of a sea turtle rookery for more than 3,000 flatback sea turtles further down the Western Australian coastline. Lastly Chevron must prevent cumulative harm from these fossil fuel projects and its third, pending LNG Wheastsone project onshore in the same remote region before expanding further. Read TIRN’s statement to Chevron at www.seaturtles.org
Chevron’s harm to sea turtles and endangered species is illustrated in an advocacy ad targeting Chevron’s human rights and environmental atrocities. The sea turtle ad shows a heavily oiled turtle rescued during the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill that illustrates the risk to endangered species from oil and gas extraction across the ocean.
Last week, traditional owners in Western Australia’s Kimberley region say they were forced to sign off on the multi-billion dollar Browse Basin gas hub, set to be built north of Broome. The Jabirr-Jabirr Goolarabooloo people last week voted in favor of the hub under threat of compulsory acquisition of their homes and lands.
Save The Kimberley co-chair and Indigenous opponent Neil McKenzie said the vote was split roughly 60-40, and he vowed yesterday to fight on against the project through the Supreme Court, declaring the decision an ”embarrassment for all.”
As documented in the third installment of the True Cost of Chevron: An Alternative Annual Report, in 2010 Chevron continued its long history of ravaging natural environments, violating human rights, ignoring the longstanding decisions of indigenous communities, destroying traditional livelihoods, and converting its dollars into unjust political influence in the United States and around the world.
The Chevron Alternative Annual Report documents accounts by more than 40 authors – led by those on the front lines of Chevron’s operations — recording egregious corporate behavior in locations as diverse as California, Burma, Colombia, Ecuador, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, the Philippines, Australia and the U.S. Gulf Coast. The report also profiles the historic victory and ongoing battle over Chevron’s crimes in Ecuador.
