Shell consultant quits, accusing agency of ‘extreme harms’ to setting | Shell

A senior security consultant has quit working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the fossil gasoline producer in a bombshell public video of inflicting “extreme harms” to the environment.

Caroline Dennett claimed Shell had a “disregard for local weather change risks” and urged others within the oil and fuel industry to “stroll away while there’s still time”.

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

Dennett accused the oil and fuel agency of “working beyond the design limits of our planetary systems” and “not putting environmental safety earlier than production”.

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

“They know that continued oil and gasoline extraction causes extreme harms, to our local weather, to our surroundings and to folks. And no matter they say, Shell is simply not winding down on fossil fuels.”

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

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

“I can no longer work for an organization that ignores all the alarms and dismisses the dangers of local weather change and ecological collapse,” she mentioned. “Because, opposite to Shell’s public expressions around net zero, they are not winding down on oil and gasoline, but planning to discover and extract rather more.”

Dennett – a criminal justice graduate who has spent her profession in research and consultancy – was impressed to cease working with Shell after watching information footage of Extinction Rise up climate protesters urging the company’s workers to depart. The movement’s TruthTeller whistleblowing venture encourages oil and gasoline staff to walk away from the industry.

The marketing consultant, who runs inner security surveys and relies in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to have the ability to walk away and “many people working in fossil gasoline companies just aren’t so fortunate”.

She urged Shell’s executives to “look within the mirror and ask themselves if they really consider their vision for extra oil and fuel extraction secures a secure future for humanity”.

In late 2020, a number of Shell executives in its clear power sector left amid studies they had been frustrated on the pace 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 cut back emissions can be mentioned at the assembly the place the Dutch activist group Observe It will push for the corporate’s insurance policies to be more in step with the Paris local weather accord. Shell’s board has advised buyers to reject the group’s resolution that asks it to set extra stringent local weather objectives.

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

The Shell chief government, Ben van Beurden, may experience an investor rebellion against his £13.5m pay packet at the AGM after the funding adviser Pirc urged a vote against it.

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A Shell spokesperson stated: “Be in no doubt, we're determined to deliver on our international strategy to be a web zero firm by 2050 and 1000's of our persons are working arduous to realize this. Now we have set targets for the brief, 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 nonetheless need oil and gasoline for decades to come back in sectors that can’t be simply decarbonised.”

Shell additionally faces the prospect of a possible windfall tax to fund cuts to family bills after the power industry reported bumper earnings fuelled by the rise in market costs, prompting opposition parties to call on the government to usher in a one-off levy.

On Monday, the biggest oil and fuel producer in the North Sea spoke out towards a one-off levy, arguing it could result in the industry approving fewer tasks.

Harbour Vitality’s chief government, Linda Cook dinner, instructed the Financial Times: “The next tax burden will make it more difficult for brand spanking new oil and fuel projects to fulfill investment hurdle charges, that means fewer projects can be sanctioned.

“That is at a time when business is being encouraged to increase home UK oil and gasoline manufacturing and assist an orderly power transition.”

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