Shell marketing consultant quits, accusing agency of ‘excessive harms’ to atmosphere | Shell

A senior safety guide 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 risks” and urged others within the oil and gasoline industry to “stroll away whereas there’s still time”.

The manager, who works for the impartial agency 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 said she had quit because of Shell’s “double-talk on local weather”.

Dennett accused the oil and fuel agency of “operating past the design limits of our planetary techniques” and “not placing environmental safety earlier than production”.

She stated: “Shell’s said safety ambition is to ‘do no hurt’ – ‘Aim Zero’, they call it – and it sounds honourable but they are utterly failing on it.

“They know that continued oil and gas extraction causes excessive harms, to our climate, to our surroundings and to individuals. And no matter they are saying, Shell is solely not winding down on fossil fuels.”

Dennett instructed 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 client” of Dennett’s enterprise, which specialises in evaluating security procedures in high-risk industries including oil and gas production. She began working with Shell within the aftermath of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, which rocked the industry.

“I can not work for an organization that ignores all the alarms and dismisses the risks of local weather change and ecological collapse,” she said. “Because, contrary to Shell’s public expressions round internet zero, they are not winding down on oil and gasoline, however planning to discover and extract way more.”

Dennett – a legal justice graduate who has spent her profession in research and consultancy – was impressed to stop working with Shell after watching news footage of Extinction Rise up climate protesters urging the company’s employees to go away. The motion’s TruthTeller whistleblowing mission encourages oil and fuel employees to stroll away from the business.

The advisor, who runs inner safety surveys and relies in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to be able 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 in the event that they actually imagine their imaginative and prescient for more oil and gasoline extraction secures a secure future for humanity”.

In late 2020, a number of Shell executives in its clear power sector left amid reports they have been annoyed 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 reduce emissions will probably be mentioned at the assembly the place the Dutch activist group Comply with It will push for the corporate’s insurance policies to be extra in line with the Paris climate accord. Shell’s board has told investors to reject the group’s resolution that asks it to set more stringent climate targets.

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

The Shell chief executive, Ben van Beurden, might experience an investor riot in opposition to his £13.5m pay packet at the AGM after the funding adviser Pirc urged a vote towards it.

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A Shell spokesperson said: “Be in no doubt, we are decided to deliver on our global technique to be a net zero company by 2050 and hundreds of our persons are working arduous to achieve this. We have now set targets for the short, medium and long term, and have every intention of hitting them.

“We’re already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon vitality, although the world will nonetheless want oil and gas for many years to come back in sectors that may’t be simply decarbonised.”

Shell also faces the prospect of a possible windfall tax to fund cuts to family bills after the energy industry reported bumper profits fuelled by the increase in market prices, prompting opposition parties to call on the government to bring in a one-off levy.

On Monday, the biggest oil and gas producer in the North Sea spoke out towards a one-off levy, arguing it will lead to the industry approving fewer tasks.

Harbour Energy’s chief executive, Linda Cook dinner, informed the Financial Occasions: “The next tax burden will make it more challenging for new oil and fuel initiatives to meet investment hurdle charges, meaning fewer initiatives will likely be sanctioned.

“This is at a time when business is being inspired to increase domestic UK oil and fuel manufacturing and support an orderly vitality transition.”

Harbour has advised the government it plans to invest $6bn in the North Sea over three years as business makes its case in opposition to the tax. The Guardian revealed this month that Cook dinner had received a £4.6m “golden howdy” from the firm.