[wordup] The True Costs of Petroleum: World Map

[Adam Shand]

From: http://www.ecologycenter.org/erc/petroleum/world.html

No corner of the world is left untouched by the effects of petroleum 
extraction and use. Many negative effects are well documented, such as 
global warming, habitat destruction, and political conflicts over oil 
supplies. But the petroleum economy extends its often hidden reach into 
many other aspects of life on our planet. Petroleum, used for 
transportation, industry, and mechanized agriculture, is the backbone of 
globalization. Institutions of global trade, such as the World Trade 
Organization (WTO), work hand in hand with oil companies, while 
militaries provide the armed backup to protect these interests. Examine 
this map to find the connections between worldwide militarization, 
environmental racism, and displacement of indigenous peoples, as well as 
the toxic consequences of extraction, use, and disposal of 
petrochemicals and plastics.

1. Alaska — The infamous 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill contaminated over 
700 miles of coastline and devastated the ecosystems in its wake. The 
Valdez spill may have faded from the public’s memory, but the fact 
remains that some wildlife populations are still not recovering. Since 
the 1970s, the extraction of crude oil from Alaska's North Slope has 
resulted in a host of environmental problems, including an average of at 
least one oil spill per day, the release of approximately 24,000 tons of 
methane gas (which contributes to global warming), noise from seismic 
exploration that has displaced migrations of bowhead whales, and mining 
and road building that disrupts river flows, negatively impacting fish 
and wildlife. Like indigenous people all over the world, the Gwich'in 
have resisted these disruptions of the natural systems on which they 
depend. In addition to enduring the effects of existing operations, the 
North Slope faces the constant threat of future expansion, including 
attempts to open the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. 
Source: Alaska Wilderness League, www.alaskawild.org.

2. Washington, D.C. — The effects of the petroleum industry on U.S. 
politics are hard to miss. President Bush II founded his own oil company 
in the 1970s, and he and his family have connections with numerous Texas 
oil ventures. These connections pay off in politics. In the 2000 
election, Bush received major financial contributions from energy 
companies and from the auto sector. Bush’s cabinet contains a record 
number of “oil people.” Vice President Cheney left Bush Sr.’s 
administration for Dallas, Texas to head up the world's biggest 
oil-services company, Halliburton. Since 1992, Halliburton has 
contributed US$1.6 billion to the campaigns of Washington-bound 
politicians. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice spent a decade 
on the Board of oil giant Chevron Corporation, a service that earned her 
the honor of having one of its supertankers named "Condoleezza." 
Meanwhile, Gail Norton, secretary of the interior, replaced office 
pictures of national parks with a photo of an oil derrick off the U.S. 
coast. Source: Project Underground.

3. Cancer Alley — "Cancer Alley" is the 80-mile toxic stretch along the 
Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, where over 100 
oil refineries, petrochemical plants, and other industries pollute the 
air, ground, and water. PVC-plastic production, vinyl manufacturing, and 
agricultural petrochemical processing are aspects of the world-wide 
petroleum industry that are often overlooked. As with the oil extraction 
and shipping industries, it is communities of color and low-income 
communities that bear the brunt of toxic pollution. One study documented 
that 80 percent of residents of Cancer Alley have respiratory problems. 
But residents — often led by elder women — are organizing to resist 
environmental racism. From the small grassroots groups filing lawsuits 
against polluters, to university study programs, to the first ever 
statewide government agency to deal with environmental justice issues, 
people are demanding that the petrochemical industry be held accountable 
to the communities it poisons. Source: Chatham College, Women’s 
Environmental Leadership and Legacy.

4. Mexico — When NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) went into 
effect in 1994, environmental, safety, and labor regulations became 
subject to challenge when they interfere with "free trade." The 
agreement provided for the opening of the US-Mexico border to 
cross-border trucking, but the U.S.'s diesel-discharge standards could 
not be applied to Mexican trucking firms. The US delayed opening its 
borders, and a NAFTA dispute between Mexico and the US persisted until 
President Bush signed an executive order allowing international trucking 
to begin without regard for environmental standards. Source: 
www.worldtradelaw.net, www.latimes.com.

5. Ecuador — In Ecuador, as in many countries, resource extraction is 
promoted by international lenders as a solution to foreign debt. Ecuador 
covers 80% of their payments on foreign debts with oil revenues. To keep 
up these revenues, the government is pushing into new oil frontiers on 
indigenous lands, creating devastated ecosystems and suffering 
communities. Oil companies exploit resources tax-free, extracting oil 
and profits for foreign investors, leaving Ecuador with the pollution. 
Between 1971 and 1991, Texaco extracted more than 1.5 billion barrels of 
oil from the Ecuadoran Amazon. In order to save millions of dollars, 
Texaco simply dumped the toxic wastes from its operations into the 
pristine rivers, forest streams and wetlands, ignoring industry 
standards. Texaco's oil operations devastated one of the most 
biologically fragile places on earth; 2.5 million acres of rainforest 
were lost. Now local Ecuadoran activists have joined with people 
affected by Chevron-Texaco’s operations in Nigeria and in Richmond, CA, 
in an international campaign and lawsuit demanding that the company 
clean up and pay up. Source: Amazon Watch, Project Underground.

6. Colombia — Colombia has been torn for decades by wars that often 
intertwine with corporate quests for oil. Here’s one example: In 1996, 
British Petroleum (BP) paid $US60 million to Colombia's Ministry of 
Defense. In return, the army agreed to supply soldiers to monitor 
construction of an oil pipeline that would speed up the transfer of 
crude oil (and vast profits) to the coast. BP provided training for 
soldiers through a private British “security” firm called Defense 
Systems Limited. According to a report commissioned by the Colombian 
government, BP also collaborated with local soldiers in kidnappings, 
torture, and murder. BP compiled photos and videotapes of local people 
protesting oil activities, to pass on to the Colombian military, which 
then arrested or kidnapped demonstrators. The U.S. government’s “War on 
Drugs” has also facilitated oil exploration and extraction in Colombia. 
The aerial spraying of vast areas with highly toxic chemical defoliants, 
themselves products of the petrochemical industry, clears out cocaine 
crops, but also opens up large areas for petroleum exploration. People 
are resisting this destruction. The indigenous U’wa people recently 
succeeded in a 10-year-long, non-violent struggle to protect their land 
from multinational giant Shell Oil. Source: Project Underground.

7. Antarctica — Numerous scientific studies have shown that accelerated 
global climate change — a result of burning carbon fuels like petroleum 
and of industrial discharges associated with petroleum extraction and 
refining—has already begun to occur. One result of this trend is the 
melting and breaking up of polar ice caps. This, in turn, leads to a 
rise in sea level, which could flood cities and ecosystems in coastal 
areas. Scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 
(IPCC) call this trend “an unintended, uncontrolled, globally pervasive 
experiment whose ultimate consequences could be second only to a global 
nuclear war." A long-term solution to the climate change problem will 
require a global transition away from fossil fuels. Sources: Greenpeace, 
Rainforest Action Network.

8. Spain — On November 19, 2002, the oil tanker Prestige broke in two 
and sank off the Spanish coast. The vessel was carrying 77,000 tons of 
fuel oil. Ecologists fear that the 26-year-old Prestige is an 
environmental time bomb resting 130 miles off the Spanish coast and two 
miles below the surface. Not only does the disaster threaten wildlife 
and public health, it also devastates local fisherpeople. It’s unlikely 
that the oil companies will take responsibility. "The oil industry 
spares no opportunity to hide behind a legal structure so complex that 
liability for their actions is almost impossible to enforce," says Ian 
Wilmore of Friends of the Earth. Source: Earthjustice, Project Underground.

9. Nigeria — Since the 1960s, drilling in the Niger Delta has caused 
hundreds of oil spills annually, as well as massive flaring from the 
extraction operations. Meanwhile, thousands of Ogoni and other 
indigenous peoples of the Niger delta have been massacred by the 
Nigerian army and police after speaking out against the destruction 
caused by the oil extraction. Oil companies like Shell and ChevronTexaco 
are closely entwined with the brutal government regime. Companies pay 
the government for drilling rights, while supplying the army with 
weapons, training and forces. Still, resistance is strong. In 2002, 
thousands of women from Itsekiri, Ilaje and Ijaw communities came 
together to demand environmental and economic justice. They occupied 
ChevronTexaco’s facilities and demanded an end to pollution, economic 
reparations for damages, support for local economic development, and 
jobs for their sons. The women met with violent repression, but 
succeeded in stalling ChevronTexaco’s operations, leading to 
negotiations and concessions by the company. Source: Project Underground.

10. The Agricultural Heartland — From petroleum-derived fertilizers, 
pesticides, and plastic packaging to transportation and refrigeration, 
our food system depends on massive consumption of fossil fuels, mainly 
oil. About 17 percent of all energy used in this country each year goes 
into growing, processing and delivering food. To meet the basic food 
needs of the eleven billion people who are expected to be alive in 2040, 
we'll need to triple the global food supply. Doing so with today's 
conventional methods, experts estimate, would require a 1,000-percent 
increase in the total energy expended in food production. Even if we 
could tolerate the global warming and pollution that would produce, it 
simply can't happen — there's nowhere near enough oil in the world to 
make it possible. Sustainable agricultural methods, including local and 
organic production, along with diet changes away from resource 
intensive, meat-heavy foods, offer the only real solution.

11. Afghanistan — To the north of Afghanistan, on the eastern shores of 
the Caspian Sea, lie some of the richest natural gas and oil fields in 
the world. Since 1996, a consortium led by Unocal had been negotiating 
with the Taliban government to build a natural gas pipeline through the 
country, but were unable to broker a deal. Conveniently enough for US 
oil companies, the US attacks on Afghanistan in 2002 led to a change in 
leadership. Afghanistan's new president, Hamid Karzai, a former Unocal 
consultant, has since lobbied for what he called the "pipeline for 
peace." Source: EurasiaNet.org, HiPakistan.com.

12. Saudi Arabia — As the country with the largest oil reserves in the 
world, Saudi Arabia’s internal struggle reflects the conflicting 
pressures of the oil economy. Because the oil industry requires enormous 
initial investments of capital, and because petroleum extraction is too 
expensive to be profitable if land and labor are fairly paid for, oil 
economies like Saudi Arabia’s tend to be built on vast inequalities. As 
local elites join forces with multi-national corporations and foreign 
governments, “cultural imperialism” tends to replace traditional ways of 
life with those modeled on a consumeristic, westernized lifestyle. In an 
attempt to maintain power, the Saudi establishment, caught between U.S. 
pressure and a rebellious population, has been pulling its investments 
out of the U.S. and wavering in its acceptance of war in Iraq. Source: 
Project Underground.

13. Iraq — This nation of 24 million people rests on the world’s 
second-largest oil reserves. Whoever controls access to Iraq’s reserves 
not only gains huge profits, but holds key leveraging power in world 
politics. The current war on Iraq, considered by many as a struggle to 
control those vast oil reserves, will cost U.S. taxpayers a minimum of 
$75 billion for the undefined length of the war, and will be followed by 
a “U.S. military presence” for ten to twenty years, according to Defense 
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. As Iraq's entire civilian infrastructure is 
restructured, Iraqi oil — which was once regulated by the Iraqi 
government — will be opened to foreign multinational ownership. U.S. 
government and corporate leaders are already drawing up plans for 
profiting on the rebuilding of Iraq, including contracting out 
rebuilding operations to "logistical" multinationals, like Halliburton, 
the world’s largest oil and gas services corporation, formerly run by 
Vice President Dick Cheney. Source: Project Underground.

14. Kuwait — The site of the last Bush v. Iraq war, this tiny nation 
offers a glimpse at the environmental horrors of war. Oil slicks, 
uncontrolled oil fires, toxic air pollution, and habitat destruction 
resulted from Iraqi sabotage and American bombings. Pollution from 
hundreds of oil well fires exceeded the daily emissions of U.S. 
industrial facilities and power plants combined, and were not fully 
contained until 8 months after the war ended. Fuel-air explosives — 
conventional weapons of mass destruction used in the Gulf War and in 
Afghanistan — ignite massive amounts of fuel above their targets. 
Militaries also consume vast quantities of fuel in their normal 
operations — 100,000 gallons per day for a single aircraft carrier. The 
very oil that is being fought over fuels the war machine, and is itself 
used as a weapon. Source: Project Underground.

15. California Offshore Drilling — Offshore drilling activities produce 
a steady stream of pollution; the industry has been marked by rampant 
spills and toxic releases. Lead, chromium, and mercury, along with 
potent carcinogens like toluene, benzene and xylene, flow into the 
ocean. Drilling activities also destroy kelp beds, reefs and coastal 
wetlands. During the ‘80s and ‘90s, coastline communities won many local 
struggles to regulate and restrict drilling. In 1994, California enacted 
a ban on new off-shore oil leasing. But in 1999, a federal agency 
renewed drilling contracts at 36 previously un-drilled sites along the 
coast. State officials and environmental groups sued, and courts have so 
far ruled that the lease extension is illegal. But industry and their 
governmental allies haven’t given up, and the struggle over off-shore 
drilling continues on both grassroots and legislative levels. Source: 
Environment California.

16. Pacific Rim — Plastic waste, an often overlooked aspect of the 
petroleum economy, is piling up in Pacific Rim countries, creating 
environmental and labor rights catastrophes. Though much of the waste is 
plastic packaging used in the U.S., it is frequently shipped overseas 
due to more lax pollution standards, combined with lower wages and 
health protections for workers. Much of this waste, including plastics 
sorted for "recycling," is eventually dumped or incinerated — over 50% 
of what's shipped, according to Greenpeace. Workers who process these 
materials receive substandard wages and are often exposed directly to 
the slew of toxins released when petroleum products are refined. Source: 
Ecology Center, Greenpeace.

17. Philippines — In the Philippines, people are finding creative and 
effective ways to protect their health against petroleum polluters. In 
Manila, residents living near a giant multi-company oil storage facility 
have formed a “bucket brigade” to collect air quality samples and 
document pollution using 5-gallon buckets. On ex-U.S. military bases, 
people have joined forces with the Filipino/American Coalition for 
Environmental Solutions to pressure the U.S. military to clean up the 
former bases, which are contaminated with petrochemicals and other 
toxins. Also in the Philippines, as in other countries around the world, 
people are organizing to ban the burning of plastics and other waste. 
Burning plastics and other petroleum products produces persistent 
pollutants like dioxin that seriously impact people’s health. The Global 
Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA), an organization with 
members in 60 countries around the world, has been extremely active in 
the Philippines, which this year became the first country to implement a 
nation-wide ban on waste incineration. Source: Filipino American 
Coalition for Environmental Solutions.

18. Kyoto Oilwatch Declaration — Fossil fuel production has destructive 
consequences at every stage, from extraction to atmospheric pollution. 
If we want to protect public health, maintain biological and cultural 
diversity, and stabilize the global climate, we must kick the fossil 
fuel habit. During the Kyoto negotiations, a coalition of more than 200 
leading organizations from 52 countries drafted the Oilwatch 
Declaration, which calls for an immediate moratorium on all new fossil 
fuel exploration (see http://www.ran.org/oilreport/kyoto.html). Usually, 
the biggest stumbling block to such international solutions is the U.S., 
which often refuses to sign or implement such treaties. Source: 
Rainforest Action Network.

19. Siberia — In the Khant-Mansy Autonomous District of Western Siberia, 
as many as 1,000 oil spills occur every year, according to the Regional 
Ecological Committee. Many indigenous families have lost their access to 
adequate pastures for reindeer herding, a cornerstone of their economic 
and cultural well-being. The situation in Siberia is part of “the oil 
industry's systematic violation of indigenous peoples' right to forge 
their own development path on their own cultural terms.” Source: Project 
Underground.

Sources / Resources

Project Underground, www.moles.org
International Forum on Globalization, www.ifg.org
Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, www.no-burn.org
International Plastics Task Force, www.ecologycenter.org/iptf/
Food First, www.foodfirst.org
Greenpeace, www.greenpeace.org
Amazon Watch, www.amazonwatch.org
Rainforest Action Network, www.ran.org
Environmentalists Against War, www.envirosagainstwar.org

Updated July, 2003
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