Shell vs.The Environment & The Public Trust

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Problem Defined - Pattern of Malicious Avoidance of Environmental Responsibilities
  • Given recent settlements Shell has faced over retail operations in the U.S., Shell decided to clandestinely dump its environmental responsibilities by selling off all of its land, buildings & equipment for every Shell service station in the United States.
  • As a part of the mass sell off, Shell is maliciously trying to hide environmental problems with the 13,000 former Texaco stations.

The secret of any "magic act" is that while everyone is watching what they think is important the magician makes the change unnoticed somewhere else. Its "the art of deception." It called "misdirection." For the Shell the "misdirection" comes from everyone believing that the environmental laws in the United States assign absolute liability to the oil companies. That's the part that is confusing the authorities. Shell only has absolute liability as long as Shell owns the land, buildings and equipment (see quote from the Riverside District Attorney in Recent Settlements). Shell had absolute liability with its franchise operation. With Shell no longer owning the land, building and equipment, by selling it all to its retailers, Shell will have "magically" escaped all its retail gasoline liability in the United States while no one was looking. Everyone was watching the liability, fines and judgments of the past. No one is watching the future where the retailers and consumers are left "holding the bag." This is exactly like the recent sub prime lending crises in financial markets. Individual retailers are "sub prime candidates for protecting the environment." They do not have adequate means to maintain and replace faulty containment systems. Shell was recently fined $10.5 million in San Diego County and $6.5 million in Riverside county for not fixing sensors and not reporting the problem as they were legally obligated to. What makes anyone think retailers with limited resources are going to do better? When the current UST system needs to be replaced (everything wears out) we look to be facing an environmental crisis. Who gets stuck with that bill? The public. Taxpayers. Having purchased their stations from Shell at premium prices, most retailers will not be able to afford the replacement costs of an aging and failing underground storage tank ("UST") systems. Shell knows its UST systems are inadequate. Look at the fines they were paying and the court cases they were losing. If Shell wasn't fixing the problem, to the point Shell was getting sued and losing, why would anyone think individual retailers will do better?  Add to that the 13,000 former Texaco stations that Shell sold to its retailers that have buried hydraulic lifts, hydraulic fluids and sump tanks with toxic wastes that will never get cleaned up. To hide the Texaco problem, Shell willfully tried to defraud the District Attorney, Riverside County and the public trust by doing a failed test and passing it off as the only test it could do (see The Right Test). 1.) Shell's mass sell off and 2.) The Texaco problem are predictable environmental problems that need to be addressed. Selling all its stations to avoid high fines and willfully not fixing the Texaco stations, Shell is following a "pattern of malicious avoidance of its environmental responsibilities;" not just in the U.S., but globally (see Pattern of Avoidance). The era of government officials collecting fat checks for "voluntary compliance" needs to end and Shell needs to be held accountable (see Voluntary Compliance).  
 

Course of Action to Cure "Bad Faith"
1) America needs to make Shell liable for testing the former Texaco stations and clean up what it finds.

2) America needs to pass legislation that makes oil companies individually and collectively responsible for gasoline spills and containment issues and equipment for all the stations they deliver to and make profits from, whether the oil company owns the dirt or not (this will preserve our current system of environmental laws effecting gasoline retailing in the U.S.).

3) The United States needs to end the practice of locking gasoline retailers into long term non-competitive product agreements with penalties. (Make the oil companies compete for retail distribution, as they should. If the oil company wants to control a particular location, they should own the dirt as they did in the past. These "penalty product agreements" are the key factor in the oil companies ability to have "their cake and eat it too," and effectively escape future environmental liabilities.)


Democracy and freedom can be bent by the powerful. Shell is openly trying to escape testing and remediating the former Texaco stations while it sells off those stations as fast as it can. Shell is almost finished in its mass sell off of all its stations in the United States. With long-term product agreements in place, Shell will sell its gasoline and make its record profits without any liability for environmental problems that the "law of decay" tells us will happen with absolute certainty.

 

Public Officials Have a Duty to Act
Left is an image of "the right test" Shell purposefully failed to do. See The Right Test.

What SeeitReal.com advocates is simple: If the major oil companies are going to be the only ones getting rich selling gasoline, let them continue to meet their environmental responsibilities whether they own the dirt or not (Shell has an absolute responsibility to clean up the former Texaco stations).

It just isn't fair to let the public bear the burden and take the expense when Shell will make record profits after shedding all its retail environmental responsibilities. The "retail pump price" will never adequately factor the "true containment and cleanup costs." Especially given the fact that "the real money" is made by the oil company and not the retailers. Accordingly, the "environmental cost burden" should remain with the oil companies.

The public and its officials can ill afford to let the major oil companies "release" themselves of the environmental laws of the U.S. Those rules were put in place under the assumption that the major oil companies would always own the dirt and be responsible. Shell selling all the land, building and equipment "releases" Shell completely. It just isn't in the public's interest to let that freely and clandestinely happen. So write your legislators and inform them that they need to act (see Write to Congress).