Two Indige­nous women, rep­re­sent­ing com­mu­ni­ties impact­ed by Shell’s oper­a­tions abroad, will attend the AGM to con­front the Chair­man and Board over the mas­sive human and eco­log­i­cal rights vio­la­tions and eco­nom­ic dev­as­ta­tion that the company’s oper­a­tions bring to Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties. They will argue that Shell’s deci­sion to pur­sue high­ly risky ‘extreme ener­gy’ projects, like Arc­tic drilling and Cana­di­an tar sands, will have lit­tle long term ben­e­fit for the com­pa­ny, and expose it to both rep­u­ta­tion­al dam­age and polit­i­cal risk, includ­ing lit­i­ga­tion.

One of the com­mu­ni­ties rep­re­sent­ed, the Athabas­ca Chipewyan First Nation (ACFN), which resides down­stream from tar sands oper­a­tions, is cur­rent­ly suing Shell for vio­lat­ing past agree­ments that have threat­ened their treaty rights. The com­mu­ni­ty is also active­ly oppos­ing two new tar sands mines Shell is propos­ing to devel­op on their land. For more details, watch the pow­er­ful film above. Legal chal­lenges by oth­er First Nations against tar sands extrac­tion on their tra­di­tion­al ter­ri­to­ries is also increas­ing.

Eriel Deranger, com­mu­ni­ty mem­ber and spokesper­son for ACFN, states:

“Shell’s cur­rent and pro­posed tar sands projects vio­late terms of our treaty, destroy our land and con­t­a­m­i­nate waters crit­i­cal to our sur­vival. The ACFN lead­er­ship has made a com­mit­ment to pro­tect our lands, rights and peo­ple cur­rent­ly being threat­ened by tar sands devel­op­ment. We have tried explor­ing amenable agree­ments and options with Shell only to be dis­ap­point­ed by their inabil­i­ty to com­pro­mise and adjust pro­posed plans to ade­quate­ly work with us which has led and con­tin­ues to lead toward lit­i­ga­tion. Our cul­ture, lands and rights can no longer stand for unabat­ed and irre­spon­si­ble devel­op­ment of tar sands in the region by Shell or any oper­a­tor.”

Shell is also under fire for its Arc­tic oper­a­tions. The com­pa­ny has spent $4.5bn secur­ing per­mits to drill in Arc­tic waters. How­ev­er it has been proven inca­pable of oper­at­ing in the area and has had to sus­pend its plans for drilling this sum­mer.

Mae R Hank, trib­al mem­ber of the Native Vil­lage of Point Hope, Alas­ka, said:

“The Beau­fort and Chukchi Seas are crit­i­cal to the Inu­pi­aq cul­ture and tra­di­tions, and pro­vide a vital habi­tat for the endan­gered bow­head whales, bel­u­ga whales, polar bears, wal­rus­es, seals and migra­to­ry birds. If an oil spill were to occur in the Arctic’s extreme con­di­tions, there is no proven method to clean it up dur­ing Win­ter. Shell is tak­ing a dead­ly risk with Inu­pi­at and oth­er Arc­tic Indige­nous peo­ples’ cul­tures and food secu­ri­ty for short­sight­ed prof­it, while the com­mu­ni­ty faces long term con­se­quences to their sur­vival.”

Shell wants to drill in the Beau­fort and Chukchi Seas, which pro­vide a vital habi­tat for polar bears as well as many oth­er endan­gered species. Pho­to by Martha de Jong-Lan­tink.

In addi­tion, the UK Tar Sands Net­work is bring­ing con­cerns to Shell’s share­hold­ers over oth­er long-term risks to the company’s invest­ments in tar sands.

The tar sands are land­locked, mak­ing them dif­fi­cult and expen­sive to get to mar­ket. The pipelines that present the industry’s only viable solu­tion to this prob­lem – such as Key­stone XL and Enbridge North­ern Gate­way – are fac­ing mas­sive pub­lic oppo­si­tion, and look unlike­ly to be built soon. The price of tar sands crude has dropped as a result. Mean­while, in Europe, the Fuel Qual­i­ty Direc­tive (FQD) is like­ly to strong­ly dis­cour­age future tar sands imports into Europe. Lax stan­dards and lack of ade­quate envi­ron­men­tal reg­u­la­tion have led to sev­er­al high-pro­file leaks and spills in recent weeks, includ­ing the flood­ing of an Arkansas sub­urb with tar sands oil. Mean­while, a recent report by the Car­bon Track­er ini­tia­tive iden­ti­fied an alarm­ing ‘car­bon bub­ble’, argu­ing that 80% of oil com­pa­nies’ cur­rent fos­sil fuel reserves are ‘unburn­able car­bon’, and antic­i­pat­ing a crash in prices as cli­mate reg­u­la­tions kick in.

In March, French oil giant Total pulled out of one of its three Cana­di­an tar sands projects, cit­ing the high costs and frag­ile prof­it mar­gins that are beset­ting the whole indus­try. Total was will­ing to take a $1.65 bil­lion loss rather than press ahead with what has become a bad invest­ment.

Shell will also be crit­i­cised by UK cam­paign­ers for heav­i­ly lob­by­ing the UK gov­ern­ment against the labelling of tar sands as high­ly pol­lut­ing in the Fuel Qual­i­ty Direc­tive. Shell was revealed to have a close rela­tion­ship with its for­mer Chief Econ­o­mist, now Sec­re­tary of State for Busi­ness and Indus­try and offi­cial ‘Min­is­ter for Shell’ Vince Cable, in a let­ter pub­lished last year. The let­ter urged him to hard­en the government’s line against the FQD, a move which was revealed to have hap­pened in leaked doc­u­ments pub­lished last week.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties in Cana­da and the Arc­tic attend­ed Shell’s AGM last year, but did not feel their con­cerns were tak­en seri­ous­ly. Pho­to by Ben Pow­less.

Suzanne Dhali­w­al, from the UK Tar Sands Net­work, com­ment­ed:

“The risk fac­tors that recent­ly led Total to ditch a major tar sands project are increas­ing. The tar sands are land­locked and expen­sive, and oppo­si­tion to new pipelines has led the price of tar sands crude to drop. Mean­while, the industry’s high emis­sions mean that Canada’s oil is increas­ing­ly look­ing like ‘unburn­able car­bon’. Despite Shell’s fren­zied lob­by­ing, upcom­ing EU leg­is­la­tion on trans­port emis­sions could close off this key future mar­ket and set a prece­dent that oth­er coun­tries will fol­low. Shell should ditch its expan­sion plans before the car­bon bub­ble bursts, expos­ing its share­hold­ers to finan­cial dis­as­ter.”