This Month (Or So) in Chevron

With all of the attention we are devoting on Opinio Juris to Chevron’s “rainforest Chernobyl” in Ecuador, it’s important not to forget that Chevron’s human and environmental destruction extends far beyond Ecuador’s borders.  Here are few of its other activities over the past month or so:

1. Five Chevron executives have been forbidden to leave Indonesia because of a remediation project between 2003 and 2011 that the Indonesian government considers fictitious.  (Sound familiar?)

2. Brazil has indicted a number of Chevron executives in connection with a significant oil leak off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.  The indictment follows the filing of an $11 billion civil suit against the company for damage caused by the leak.

3. Chevron continues to deal with the fallout from an explosion at one of its oil rigs in Nigeria, which killed two people and injured many more.

4. Chevron continues to try to clean up an oil spill from one of its refineries in Pascagoula, Mississippi.

5. Chevron is being sued by wealthy residents of Salt Lake City for damage caused by a series of ruptures in one of its oil pipelines.

It’s not all bad news, though.  Chevron has demanded that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission prevent Spectra Energy from building a natural-gas pipeline across Bayonne, New Jersey, arguing that the pipeline carries “significant risk of profound environmental damage.”

Of course, Chevron doesn’t actually oppose the pipeline.  It just doesn’t want it built across that particular stretch of land — which is owned by Chevron/Texaco.