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

A senior security guide has give up working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the fossil gas producer in a bombshell public video of causing “extreme harms” to the setting.

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

The executive, who works for the independent 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 mentioned she had quit because of Shell’s “double-talk on climate”.

Dennett accused the oil and gas firm of “operating past the design limits of our planetary systems” and “not placing environmental security earlier than production”.

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

“They know that continued oil and fuel extraction causes extreme harms, to our climate, to the environment and to folks. And no matter they are saying, Shell is simply not winding down on fossil fuels.”

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

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

“I can not work for a corporation that ignores all of the alarms and dismisses the risks of local weather change and ecological collapse,” she stated. “Because, opposite to Shell’s public expressions around internet zero, they don't seem to be winding down on oil and fuel, however planning to explore and extract far more.”

Dennett – a prison justice graduate who has spent her career in analysis and consultancy – was impressed to cease working with Shell after watching news footage of Extinction Insurrection climate protesters urging the corporate’s workers to leave. The motion’s TruthTeller whistleblowing project encourages oil and gasoline workers to stroll away from the industry.

The advisor, who runs internal safety surveys and is based in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to have the ability to stroll away and “many individuals working in fossil gasoline corporations just aren’t so fortunate”.

She urged Shell’s executives to “look within the mirror and ask themselves in the event that they really 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 vitality sector left amid reports they had 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 can be discussed at the meeting where the Dutch activist group Comply with This can push for the company’s insurance policies to be extra in keeping with the Paris climate accord. Shell’s board has informed investors to reject the group’s resolution that asks it to set extra stringent local weather targets.

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

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

Signal up to the daily Enterprise Immediately e mail or follow Guardian Business on Twitter at @BusinessDesk

A Shell spokesperson stated: “Be in little doubt, we are decided to deliver on our global strategy to be a internet zero firm by 2050 and 1000's of our persons are working onerous to attain this. We have now set targets for the brief, medium and long run, and have each intention of hitting them.

“We’re already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon power, although the world will nonetheless need oil and fuel for decades to come in sectors that can’t be easily decarbonised.”

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

On Monday, the biggest oil and gasoline producer in the North Sea spoke out in opposition to a one-off levy, arguing it will lead to the trade approving fewer projects.

Harbour Vitality’s chief government, Linda Cook dinner, advised the Monetary Instances: “A better tax burden will make it more difficult for new oil and gas tasks to fulfill funding hurdle rates, that means fewer tasks shall be sanctioned.

“This is at a time when trade is being inspired to increase home UK oil and gasoline manufacturing and assist an orderly power transition.”

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