Shell advisor quits, accusing firm of ‘extreme harms’ to environment | Shell

A senior safety advisor has stop working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the fossil fuel producer in a bombshell public video of causing “excessive harms” to the surroundings.

Caroline Dennett claimed Shell had a “disregard for local weather change dangers” and urged others in the oil and gasoline business to “walk away whereas there’s nonetheless time”.

The chief, who works for the unbiased company Clout, ended her working relationship with Shell in an open letter to its executives and 1,400 workers. In an accompanying video, posted on LinkedIn, she mentioned she had quit because of Shell’s “double-talk on climate”.

Dennett accused the oil and gasoline firm of “operating past the design limits of our planetary methods” and “not placing environmental safety before production”.

She mentioned: “Shell’s said safety ambition is to ‘do no hurt’ – ‘Objective Zero’, they name it – and it sounds honourable but they're completely failing on it.

“They know that continued oil and fuel extraction causes extreme harms, to our climate, to the environment and to people. And whatever they say, Shell is simply not winding down on fossil fuels.”

Dennett informed the Guardian she “couldn't marry these conflicts with my conscience”, adding: “I couldn't carry that any longer, and I’m ready to deal with the consequences.”

Shell was a “main consumer” of Dennett’s enterprise, which specialises in evaluating security procedures in high-risk industries together with oil and gasoline production. She started working with Shell within the aftermath of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, which rocked the business.

“I can now not work for an organization that ignores all the alarms and dismisses the dangers of climate change and ecological collapse,” she said. “Because, opposite to Shell’s public expressions around net zero, they are not winding down on oil and gasoline, however planning to discover and extract much more.”

Dennett – a felony justice graduate who has spent her career in research and consultancy – was inspired to stop working with Shell after watching information footage of Extinction Rise up local weather protesters urging the corporate’s workers to depart. The movement’s TruthTeller whistleblowing mission encourages oil and gas employees to walk away from the industry.

The advisor, who runs internal safety surveys and relies in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to have the ability to walk away and “many individuals working in fossil gasoline firms simply aren’t so lucky”.

She urged Shell’s executives to “look in the mirror and ask themselves in the event that they really consider their imaginative and prescient for extra oil and fuel extraction secures a safe future for humanity”.

In late 2020, several Shell executives in its clear energy sector left amid reports they have been frustrated on the tempo of Shell’s shift in the direction of greener fuels.

Her announcement comes on the eve of Shell’s AGM in London on Tuesday. Its plans to scale back emissions will probably be discussed at the meeting where the Dutch activist group Observe It will push for the company’s insurance policies to be extra in line with the Paris climate accord. Shell’s board has advised traders to reject the group’s decision that asks it to set extra stringent local weather goals.

The Shell investor Royal London has stated it intends to abstain on a vote on the firm’s climate transition proposals.

The Shell chief government, Ben van Beurden, could experience an investor insurrection in opposition to his £13.5m pay packet on the AGM after the investment adviser Pirc urged a vote towards it.

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A Shell spokesperson said: “Be in little question, we're determined to ship on our international strategy to be a web zero firm by 2050 and hundreds of our people are working arduous to achieve this. We have set targets for the quick, medium and long run, and have every intention of hitting them.

“We’re already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon energy, though the world will still need oil and gas for many years to return in sectors that may’t be easily decarbonised.”

Shell also faces the prospect of a potential windfall tax to fund cuts to household bills after the power business reported bumper income fuelled by the rise in market prices, prompting opposition events to name on the government to usher in a one-off levy.

On Monday, the biggest oil and fuel producer in the North Sea spoke out in opposition to a one-off levy, arguing it would lead to the industry approving fewer initiatives.

Harbour Vitality’s chief executive, Linda Cook dinner, informed the Financial Times: “A better tax burden will make it more difficult for brand spanking new oil and fuel projects to meet investment hurdle rates, that means fewer tasks shall be sanctioned.

“This is at a time when industry is being encouraged to increase domestic UK oil and gas manufacturing and support an orderly energy transition.”

Harbour has told the government it plans to speculate $6bn within the North Sea over three years as industry makes its case against the tax. The Guardian revealed this month that Prepare dinner had obtained a £4.6m “golden hey” from the agency.