Shell guide quits, accusing firm of ‘excessive harms’ to atmosphere | Shell

A senior safety marketing consultant has give up working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the fossil gas producer in a bombshell public video of inflicting “excessive harms” to the environment.

Caroline Dennett claimed Shell had a “disregard for climate change dangers” and urged others within the oil and gas trade to “stroll away whereas there’s nonetheless time”.

The executive, 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 mentioned she had stop because of Shell’s “double-talk on climate”.

Dennett accused the oil and gas firm of “operating beyond the design limits of our planetary methods” and “not placing environmental security before manufacturing”.

She mentioned: “Shell’s said security ambition is to ‘do no harm’ – ‘Aim Zero’, they name it – and it sounds honourable but they're utterly failing on it.

“They know that continued oil and gas extraction causes excessive harms, to our climate, to our environment and to people. And whatever they are saying, Shell is just not winding down on fossil fuels.”

Dennett instructed the Guardian she “couldn't marry these conflicts with my conscience”, including: “I couldn't carry that any longer, and I’m ready to take care of the implications.”

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

“I can not work for an organization that ignores all the alarms and dismisses the risks of climate change and ecological collapse,” she said. “As a result of, contrary to Shell’s public expressions around web zero, they don't seem to be winding down on oil and gas, however planning to explore and extract much more.”

Dennett – a legal justice graduate who has spent her career in analysis and consultancy – was inspired to cease working with Shell after watching news footage of Extinction Insurrection local weather protesters urging the corporate’s staff to go away. The motion’s TruthTeller whistleblowing project encourages oil and gasoline staff to walk away from the trade.

The marketing consultant, who runs inner safety surveys and is based in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to be able to stroll away and “many people working in fossil gas companies just aren’t so fortunate”.

She urged Shell’s executives to “look in the mirror and ask themselves in the event that they actually consider their imaginative and prescient for more oil and gasoline extraction secures a protected future for humanity”.

In late 2020, several Shell executives in its clear power sector left amid experiences they have been frustrated at the pace of Shell’s shift towards greener fuels.

Her announcement comes on the eve of Shell’s AGM in London on Tuesday. Its plans to scale back emissions will be mentioned on the assembly the place the Dutch activist group Observe It will push for the corporate’s insurance policies to be more consistent with the Paris local weather accord. Shell’s board has instructed buyers to reject the group’s resolution that asks it to set more stringent climate targets.

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

The Shell chief government, Ben van Beurden, may expertise an investor riot against his £13.5m pay packet on the AGM after the funding adviser Pirc urged a vote in opposition to it.

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A Shell spokesperson said: “Be in no doubt, we are determined to ship on our world strategy to be a web zero firm by 2050 and hundreds of our persons are working arduous to achieve this. Now we have set targets for the brief, medium and long term, and have each intention of hitting them.

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

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

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

Harbour Energy’s chief executive, Linda Cook, informed the Monetary Times: “A higher tax burden will make it tougher for brand spanking new oil and fuel tasks to fulfill funding hurdle rates, meaning fewer tasks can be sanctioned.

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

Harbour has instructed the federal government it plans to take a position $6bn in the North Sea over three years as trade makes its case against the tax. The Guardian revealed this month that Prepare dinner had received a £4.6m “golden hi there” from the agency.