• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 2186 0

oil fields at opposite ends of the spectrum of harmful versus beneficial environmental impacts. I found these experiences instructive, because I had previously assumed that oil industry impacts were overwhelmingly harmful. Like much of the public, I loved to hate the oil industry, and I deeply suspected the credibility of anyone who dared to report anything positive about the industry’s performance or its contribution to society. My observations forced me to think about factors that might encourage more companies to set positive examples.

My first experience of an oil field was on Salawati Island off the coast of Indonesian New Guinea. The purpose of my visit there had nothing to do with oil but was part of a survey of birds on islands of the New Guinea region; it merely happened that much of Salawati had been leased for oil exploration to the Indonesian national oil company, Pertamina. I visited Salawati in 1986 with the permission and as a guest of Pertamina, whose vice president and public relations officer kindly provided me with a vehicle to drive along company roads.

In view of that kindness, I am sorry to report on the conditions that I encountered. From a long distance, the field’s location could be recognized by a flame shooting out of a high tower, where natural gas obtained as a by-product of oil extraction was being burned off, there being nothing else to do with it. (Facilities to liquefy and transport it for sale were lacking.) To construct access roads through Salawati’s forests, swathes 100 yards wide had been cleared, much too wide for many species of New Guinea rainforest mammals, birds, frogs, and reptiles to cross. There were numerous oil spills on the ground. I encountered only three species of large fruit pigeons, of which 14 have been recorded elsewhere on Salawati and which are among the prime targets of hunters in the New Guinea region because they are large, meaty, and good to eat. A Pertamina employee described to me the location of two pigeon breeding colonies, where he said that he hunted them with his shotgun. I assume that their numbers within the field had been depleted by hunting.

My second experience was of the Kutubu oil field that a subsidiary of the large international oil company Chevron Corporation operated in the Kikori River watershed of Papua New Guinea. (I shall refer to the operator for short as “Chevron” in the present tense, but the actual operator was Chevron Niugini Pty. Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of Chevron Corporation; the field was a joint venture of six oil companies, including Chevron Niugini Pty. Ltd.; the parent company Chevron Corporation merged in 2001 with Texaco to become ChevronTexaco; and in 2003 ChevronTexaco sold its interests in the joint venture, whose operator then became another one of the partners, Oil Search Limited.) The environment in the Kikori River watershed is sensitive and difficult to work in because of frequent landslides, much limestone karst terrain, and one of the highest recorded rainfalls in the world (on the average, 430 inches per year, and up to 14 inches per day). In 1993 Chevron engaged World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to prepare a large-scale integrated conservation and development project for the whole watershed. Chevron’s expectation was that WWF would be effective at minimizing environmental damage, lobbying the Papua New Guinea government for environmental protection, serving as a credible partner in the eyes of environmental activist groups, benefiting local communities economically, and attracting World Bank funding for local community projects. From 1998 to 2003 I made four visits of one month each to the oil fields and watershed as a consultant to WWF. I was allowed freedom to travel throughout the area in a WWF vehicle and to interview Chevron employees privately.

As my airplane flight from Papua New Guinea’s capital of Port Moresby droned on towards the field’s main airstrip at Moro and was approaching its scheduled arrival time, I looked out the airplane window for some signs of the oil field infrastructure that I expected