239 Exxon Corp Exxon's catch phrase, "Put a tiger in your tank", was the 1960s brainchild of the corporation's executive Ernest Dichter who wanted to create a "Global Shopping Center" run by Exxon (1). The sheer size of this largest of all conglomerates can be gauged from the fact that, in 1980, Exxon's sales were larger than the gross national product (GNP) of all but some twenty countries in the world (2). That year, it produced 11.4 million tons of coal, 39,000 tons of copper, and 3.6 million pounds of uranium oxide (2). Esso UK is Britain's fourth most important corporation in terms of profits, shooting to a lead position from almost nowhere in a bare twenty years (3). In 1984, it turned in a record œ1 billion to its US parent (4). Esso AG in the early 1980s ranked as the twenty-ninth biggest West German industrial concern, while Esso SA Francaise ranked as 39th in France (2). In Australia, Esso Exploration and Production is the tenth largest domestic company, while Esso Australia Ltd is number 42 (5).
Worldwide, Exxon oil and gas operations touch virtually every major resource region, ranging from JVs with AOG in Australia (6), with Royal Dutch/Shell in Mozambique in the north Rovuma basin (7), to exploitation of certain oil and gas interests acquired from WR Grace in 1985 at a cost of US$126.5M (8). In 1987, it also bid for control of Canada's Dome Petroleum (9).
Exxon has been rightly called "probably one of the two most strategic companies in the US economy" (1) (the other being General Motors). Although only number 38 in terms of defence contracts (10), by the early 1970s Exxon had acquired the largest reserves of uranium of any oil major, except Gulf (11). Its ascendancy in virtually every aspect of nuclear fuel production and enrichment has been exceeded by few other US corporations. In 1985, Exxon possessed nearly US$100,000,000,000 of world-wide oil and gas reserves, was collecting nearly US$7,000 million in chemical revenues and almost US$400 million from coal (7). The previous year it shot ahead of General Motors as America's biggest profit earner by no less than US$800 million (12). In 1986 it confirmed its position as "the biggest profit earner in corporate America" (13).
Such a scale of income accretion - unexampled in the field of human endeavour (or rapaciousness) - has not been won without "sacrifice". Indeed, the losses chalked up by the company in the field of mineral exploitation (including uranium) over the past decade might have ruined any lesser mortal entity. And the combination of ruthlessness and adaptability, which enabled the original Standard Oil Trust to achieve unique dominance over oil supplies and trading in the early years of the twentieth century, have been urgently required on many occasions in recent years.
Starting an unstoppable process, in 1951 Premier Mussadeq of Iran nationalised Exxon (and other western oil assets) only to be removed by the CIA somewhat later (14). In 1962, Ceylon nationalised Esso's oil interests, causing US aid to be cut off (1).
The company's Philippine oil interests were nationalised in 1973 (12) after the company's Philippines subsidiary had refused to sell oil to the US Navy at Subic Bay because "its overriding interest was to help enforce the world-wide Arab boycott of the United States" (1).
Venezuela also nationalised the company in 1975, while other governments, such as Nigeria's, increased their equity in Exxon's operations (12). Nor has the process come to a stop, even as the oil price has taken a dive. Esso-Papas was taken over by the Greek government in 1984, very much a "new socialist" move (15). A year later, Norway's Statoil bought up the Swedish oil and petrochemical operations of the company for US$270 million (16) and the Finnish Kemira took over Esso Chemie of the Netherlands around the same time (17).
Not surprisingly, Exxon's income remained static during most of the 1970s (12) but it picked up dramatically at the turn of the decade, as the company began diversifying at home into "synfuels", biotechnology, electric motors, and office systems; and as it consolidated operations in poorer third world countries, opening their door to foreign investment. (In Brazil in 1976, for example, Exxon's ratio of surplus generated to capital employed was no less than 62.33%) (18). It also began trimming its coat elsewhere to suit its cloth - specifically its reduced income from oil (12).
The trimming continued well into the 1980s with the selling of its office systems subsidiary in 1984 for US$100 million (19) and a reduction in capital spending by US$2.8 billion in 1986 (20). That year, Exxon drastically restructured itself, closing down Esso Europe and other affiliates based in the US, absorbing Exxon International into a "new international company" and forming a new company to coordinate coal and minerals activities (21).
By then, the company was still turning in "fabulous" profits from its upstream activities, but losing out "just about everywhere else" (22). It started buying up its own shares, as the result of a surplus of cash and diminishing opportunities to invest it profitably. As the Financial Times reported in 1985, Exxon had "entirely lost confidence in its ability to diversify" (22).
As Exxon passed its 120th birthday (January 10th 1990), it is remarkable that the successor to Standard Oil should still be based so firmly in the exploitation of oil, and that it should still operate within the mind-set adopted by the company's founder, John D Rockefeller: preserving a strong, almost cabalistic centre; sending in "an army to tackle a problem, where competitors would make do with a platoon" (22); deploying unprecedented aggregates of windfall profit to march on areas where few have trodden, and quitting just as dramatically when the going got tough; above all, regarding the whole globe as its oyster, and government as the tool (as in Iran and Chile) to establish itself wherever it chooses to go.
It is only within living memory that Exxon - at a cost of no less than US$100 million (1) changed its name from Standard Oil. The question of who controls this megalith is one that has exercised a number of keen minds - not the least US Senator Lee Metcalf who, in 1972, failed to gain from the Securities and Exchange Commission a list of the company's shareholders and met with the rebuff that the information was "privileged and confidential" from the corporation itself (1).
Beyond doubt, in the latter half of the 19th century, Standard Oil was synonymous with one man: "the history of oil [at this time] was also the personal history of John D Rockefeller, who tamed an anarchic industry and brought it under the direct control of Standard Oil" (23). In 1863, Rockefeller purchased a Cleveland oil refinery. Seven years later he formed the Standard Oil Trust, manifestly to monopolise not only the US, but the world's oil industry (24). By the turn of the century, however, strenuous competition had emerged in the shape of Gulf Oil, Texaco and Shell Transport and Trading on the home front, Nobel and the Rothschilds in Russia, and the Royal Dutch Petroleum Co in the Far East (24).
Rockefeller was hardly deterred. From 1870 to 1877, with unparalleled ruthlessness, he virtually obliterated all competition in the US. "When he began his campaign, the Standard was flanked by 15 refineries in New York,12 in Philadelphia, 22 in Pittsburgh and 27 in the oil regions. When he finished, there was only the Standard" (25). By 1880, Rockefeller was refining no less than 95% of all oil in the USA (25). Two years later, Rockefeller consolidated his stranglehold by forming the Standard Oil Trust, and concentrating ownership in the hands of only nine trustees. The Trust embraced forty corporations of which fourteen were wholly owned. Under this arrangement "... it was never clear who owned what or who was responsible for which actions" (25). The Trust then moved overseas, setting up subsidiaries such as the Anglo-American Oil Co making secret purchases of stock, and engaging in a price-cutting war. Although the Trust's success was far from complete, by the 1890s "... [as] in a Conrad novel, Standard agents were rushing into the hearts of darkness everywhere, carrying their products by sampans, camels, oxen and on the backs of native bearers ... A transoceanic empire lay before them ... the Era of American Economic Supremacy had begun" (25).
By 1911, advocates of free trade and competition gained the upper hand, and the US government felt strong enough to break up the Trust, thus spawning today's Standard Oil of New Jersey (Exxon), Standard Oil of Ohio (Sohio) and Standard Oil of Indiana (Amoco). Smaller split-off operations later grew to considerable size as mainly domestic companies - companies like Atlantic (now Arco), Tide Water (to be absorbed into Getty), Continental (Conoco), Phillips and Cities Service (24).
The formal price and territorial war reached an armistice in 1928, when Standard Oil of New Jersey, BP and Royal Dutch/Shell concluded an "as is" agreement, fixing prices at the high level of the Texas/Gulf production zone. The Big Three were joined by four others over the next two decades. Despite (or because of) a decline in the growth of US production, the big seven consolidated their hold over the world market especially the Middle East, throughout the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Exxon never moved from the top position in this period. Until as late as 1939, it remained the only truly international corporation among the so-called "Sisters" and on the eve of the OPEC "revolution" was still "the kingpin" (24).
Oil denoted not only control of energy resources and therefore the lifeblood of industry, but the most powerful generator of cash and thus control of US banking. John D Rockefeller and JP Morgan (see US Steel) formed an alliance more than eighty years ago which, by the 1960s, gave the Rockefeller-Morgan nexus dominance not only of America's largest banks, but key sectors of mining, airlines (24), insurance (26), philanthropy, academic institutions, and, of course, politics. Exxon's political connections and chicanery could fill a large volume in their own right. Nelson Rockefeller's influence over US policy in South America, and specifically support for right-wing regimes (27), was mirrored by the co-operation between Exxon and IG Farben - the powerhouse of the Nazi state - even when the administration had decided on war with Germany (28).
One of IG Farben's key officers was Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands who built up a considerable private stake in Exxon, and chaired the first meeting of the Bilderberg Commission in Oosterbeek, 1954. Little wonder that David Rockefeller was also a founding member of Bilderberg - this prime means of "western collective management of the world order" (29); Emilio Collado, executive of Exxon and a director of JP Morgan, was another co-conspirator (29).
Then in 1973, Rockefeller, flanked by Zbigniew Brzezinski and other prominent US Americans, including Exxon director James K Jamieson, founded the Trilateral Commission - a most important vehicle for the propagation of western values, and maintenance of western industrial power, outside of government (29).
From 1965, Exxon entered the coal industry through "extensive grass-roots" activities (2) - a euphemism for a game-plan conceived in the early part of the decade, as the threat to Exxon's position as a world oil producer from "nationalist" forces in the third world became obvious. Coal
This was a period when Exxon moved concertedly into "safe" areas, such as Australia, the North Sea, the MacKenzie River Basin of Canada and Alaska's North Slope (30). Crucial to the Grand Plan for US energy self-sufficiency was the transfer of coal reserves - their price driven to rock-bottom because of cheap oil - to corporate control. Within a short period, particularly 1964 to 1967, under the direction of Secretary of the Interior Udall, Exxon, Conoco, Amax, Burlington Northern and Union Pacific bought up a huge share (31%) of Indian and public lands in the Four Corners region and the Great Plains, and Exxon was the biggest acquisitor of coal reserves among them (30). Indeed within a decade, Exxon was the largest holder of coal reserves among oil companies (31).
Within a few years, the company was sustaining heavy losses from its coal operations, but by the late 1970s had its act together. In 1980, it was the USA's fifth largest producer of coal (2), and by 1985 was reaping nearly four and a half hundred million dollars in annual coal income (32), with four operating mines in the USA, and from 1981 - a JV with Denison at Quintette (16.75%) in Canada (33). Esso Australia holds 25% of the Hail Creek coking coal mine in Queensland (AAR Ltd 44%, IOL Coal Pty Ltd 2%, Marubeni Coal Pty Ltd 4%, Sumisho Coal Dev Pty Ltd 25%) which, though developed ahead of schedule (34) was still looking for customers (32). One potential customer is Hong Kong, with whom Exxon is co-operating in the construction of a coal-fired power station (35). Talks were being conducted with the Hong Kong utility China Light and Power in 1987, regarding the building of another power station on Tsingyi Island, but it is not known whether this too would be coal-powered (36).
The company's largest coal involvement by far is its 50% share in the El Cerrejon mine (owned and operated by Intercor, in which the Colombian government agency Carbocol holds the other half). Exxon developed El Cerrejon using windfall profits from its Dutch natural gas operations, and with the permission of the Dutch government (37). This will be South America's vastest coal mine (38) with an initial investment of US$3.2 billion. "All the numbers associated with El Cerrejon are staggering" commented the President of Carbocol in 1984 (39). Seen as "setting the pattern for the steam coal industry" (40) by the time it began exporting in early 1985, the project was ahead of schedule, raising expectations that it could provide up to 10% of the world market for coal for power (41).
But the project has been beset by controversy, especially over its phenomenal costs. In the early years, several Carbocol officials resigned, claiming that the project "endangered Colombia's long-term economic welfare", comprising "a monstrosity of enormous injury to our national interests" (42). Exxon was exempted from certain taxes, benefitting from "high profit remission rates not granted other foreign firms" (42) while, critics claimed, there was no firm guarantee of a transfer of technology, and job prospects for Colombians had been grossly exaggerated (42).
By 1986, the costs remained "crushing" - with Carbocol's foreign debt reaching no less than US$1.4 billion - and in 1987, with steam coal over-supply threatening El Cerrejon's profitability, the Colombian government was looking for a buyer for its own 49% interest (37) - Shell being one possibility (7).
Total 1987 production (9 million tonnes) was set to make Intercor the second largest supplier in the world (after Poland's Weglokoks) with predictions that it would reach the number 1 spot by 1990 (43). Carbocol concluded its first contract with the Danish Elsam in 1980 (44), and is likely to be supplying Sweden, Spain, Brazil, Korea, Japan, the Netherlands and Britain, as well as the USA (45). This, despite opposition from the US United Mineworkers Union, who campaigned against sales to US Gulf utilities in 1984 (46).
Venezuelan and Colombian indigenous organisations - notably CRIC (Colombia), MIIN (Indigenous Movement for National Identity), and ACIPY (The Indigenous Civil Association of the Yukpa People) (the latter two Venezuelan) - have expressed particular alarm at the El Cerrejon developments, not only in the indigenous regions of the Guajira and the Rio Guasare basins, but on Wayuu territory, which straddles the Venezuelan-Colombian border. In particular, an airstrip contracted by Intercor in the early 1980s "has divided our territory, destroying our territorial integrity" (47).
In 1987, the Colombian daily El Heraklo claimed that the ELN (National Liberation Army) had dynamited a new 600-mile pipeline around 30 times in the previous 18 months, threatening a further sabotage if Intercor and Carbocol didn't pay several million dollars in protection insurance. The company retorted that the mine "never had this problem, perhaps because historically the Guajira Desert has never been an area accessible to guerilla activity" (48).
"As the world's largest private company, Exxon commands the wherewithal to pursue mining from scratch perhaps better than any other firm" commented one observer in the 1980s (2). But despite this promise the company's mineral interests "have proven the least profitable" sector of its activities, representing "almost a 'worst case' scenario" (2). By the early 1980s, Exxon's income from its copper, lead, zinc, molybdenum and uranium interests were "clearly dreadful" (2). While investment in coal had tripled, the company cut back drastically on metals and nuclear energy development. Metals
In 1985, the company lost US$21 million in minerals revenues (7). No wonder that, in 1987, Exxon terminated all mineral exploration in the USA, after cutting 60% off its exploration budget; in turn its exploration budget for Canada was cut by 20% and Exxon Minerals announced that it would, in future, concentrate only on the acquisition of polymetallic and precious metals properties (49).
One of its most recent Canadian ventures is a gold JV at Opapimiskan Lake, Ontario, with Dome Exploration and the Canadian Nickel Company (6). Significantly, Exxon has also announced the selling off of all its exploration projects in Australia and Papua New Guinea for US$44 million (32). This decision means that Esso will no longer hold a 50% share in the Harbour Lights gold project in Western Australia, where its partners were Carr Boyd and Aztec Exploration, and its prospects of becoming the fourth largest gold producer in Western Australia were good (50). Nor will it proceed with its Bimurra (Queensland) JV with Samantha Exploration, Buka Minerals and Samson Exploration, announced in 1980 (51).
However, Esso Resources of Australia will retain its 31.16% interest in the Golden Grove multi-metal deposit at Gossan Hill and Scuddles in Western Australia (where copper, zinc, gold and silver reserves total 36 million tons) (48) and where Esso is partnered by EZ (31.16%), Amax (31.16%), and Aztec (6.5%). City Resources of Australia has bid for all Esso's gold interests in Australia and Papua New Guinea (52).
In 1984, Esso Resources of Canada entered a JV with Lasmin Resources and St Andrew's Gold fields to explore for three years certain claims in the Lasmin Esso Resources JV area of Cochrane, Ontario (6). While it gave up its share in a Canadian copper-molybdenum project to its partner Granduc Mines in 1985 (6), it was awaiting final decision on another molybdenum project in 1987. This is the huge (30,000 tons/day ore) US$600 million prospect at Mount Hope, Nevada - a venture which will require 10,000 acres of public land (48), disturb some 3,000 acres, and dump tailings over an other 2,500 acres and some 35 miles of public right of way (53). Little wonder that this "biggest mining venture in Nevada history" (54) has still been awaiting environmental approval (48). In 1982, Exxon ceded all rights in its Pinos Altos (New Mexico) copper-zinc-silver prospect to Boliden AB (55).
Exxon's exploration programmes continue in West Germany and Spain, with reconnaissance in several other countries (6, 55), but with severe reductions in north America and Australia.
At Crandon, in Wisconsin - perhaps its most controversial project of modern times (see below) - development of a US$900 million copper-zinc-gold and lead project has been suspended.
This means that the company's most important mineral project currently in operation is its Disputada complex in Chile (El Soldado and Los Bronces) which it acquired in early 1978, when its subsidiary Exxon Minerals Chile Inc (EMCI) purchased the Disputada de las Condes SA, from the Chilean junta and private investors for US$112 million (56). Exxon's Disputada investment is the largest foreign investment in the country (57).
Los Bronces is an open-pit mine 70 miles north-east of Santiago, while El Soldado is an underground mine, 130km north-west of the capital. Both a concentrator (El Cobre) and smelter (Chagres) are close to the mine (6). Initially the project proved highly unprofitable (2). But in 1985, plans were announced to double production at El Soldado (58) with full output of 11,500 tons/day copper sulphide ore (at 1.5% copper content) (48). Meanwhile, plans to expand Los Bronces have been "downgraded" (48).
Exxon's decision to invest so heavily in Chile, following the 1973 reactionary military coup of Pinochet, was highly significant for the dictatorship: until then, its efforts to secure big foreign capital had been largely unsuccessful. Said Business Latin America at the time " [the investment] constitutes a public relations breakthrough as much as an economic milestone for this country. Not only is it the largest single investment by a US firm in many years, but it has been made by a large, image-conscious corporation indicating that international business is giving its blessing to the Chilean military junta" (59).
The importance of the 1978 Exxon deal for the Chilean military is underlined by the fact that, prior to Exxon's acquisition, Disputada had been losing money for nine years (54).
In 1979, Exxon took a turn which led directly to the diversifications and divestments of the 1980s. It began to invest enormously in so-called synthetic fuels: also it bid for Reliance Electric. Synfuels
This new strategy was predicated on Exxon's determination to maintain control over future energy developments, without sacrificing its lead as the world's biggest supplier of oil and petroleum products. As the company's "burly" chairman, Clifton Garvin, mapped it out at the time: "... we'll be moving ahead in three broad directions ... Oil, gas and petrochemical activities will continue to be major segments of our business. At the same time we'll be investing increasingly in alternative energy areas" (60). Earlier that year, under the pressure of nationalisation from third world producers, and the revolution in Iran, Exxon had decided to become a net buyer of oil, and cut back its production by 15%. By "alternative energy" Garvin clearly meant "the transformation of coal into more acceptable liquid or gas forms and oil shale", although in 1979 he made an obligatory nod in the direction of solar power (60).
In fact Exxon had long dug into the solar market. When ERDA (the Energy Research and Development Administration) was set up by the US government in 1975, the company secured representation on no less than 15 separate advisory committees (61). Two years later, Exxon's Daystar subsidiary was awarded a total of US$ 1.1 million in contracts for heating and hot water systems disbursed through a government agency (HUD). One of Daystar's solar products was a solar collector "developed by aerospace engineers in a government-funded corporate laboratory [with Exxon] using its connections in Washington to subsidise the growth of its acquisition to a point where it already shares domination of the solar industry with ten or twelve other major manufacturers, and has written an "expansion" programme to suit the needs of its other corporate interests" (61). In particular, the other interests "fed" by Exxon's forays into solar power included laser fusion and specifically a project conducted since 1972 with General Electric to "rejuvenate" spent nuclear fuel rods (61).
That Exxon was no more serious about developing solar power in its own right, as a truly alternative source of energy for human needs, was exemplified in a shabby advertising campaign run in late 1976 in major American dailies, such as the New York Times. "Exxon answers questions about one of the newest sources of energy under the sun - The Sun!" ran the headline. Underneath, Exxon claimed that home space heating could cost up to US$20,000 using solar collectors, and around US$2,000 to provide domestic hot water "about three times more than conventional energy systems". "When will solar power become a major source of energy?" asked Exxon, answering itself: "Possibly in the next century."
These advertisements drew complaints about flagrant distortion from Senator Gary Hart (later to achieve notoriety in the Presidential nominations race of 1987) and Representative Richard Ottinger, who pointed out that Daystar was marketing hot water systems for half the price claimed by its own parent company. So - "Why is Exxon involved in solar energy?" asked Ray Reece in his expose of the corporate seizure of US solar energy development. "[It] might simply be that Exxon intends for solar energy to be kept under wraps until fossil fuel markets are exhausted" (61).
In fact, by 1983, the company's Solar Power Corporation had failed at a cost of US$30 million because - according to one source - the photovoltaic market "would not penetrate the Third World's rural areas fast enough or profitably enough for the oil giant" (62). Exxon's vice-president John Wurmser reflected that "... no-one asks what would happen if three billion people (in the Third World) who don't have electricity today can't afford photovoltaics".
So, although Garvin forsees the future as "fundamentally electricity based" (63), Exxon has no concern for cheap or democratically controlled ways of reaching that goal, let alone "softer" energy developments which depend on truly renewable or benign sources of power and are appropriate for heating and cooking as well as lighting, industrial processes, and transport.
This was exemplified by Exxon's most significant and controversial take-over in its recent history, that of Reliance Electric. This marked an important strategic departure, since it was the company's first major acquisition, as opposed to "ground floor" development - as in uranium, coal, copper and chemicals (64).
During the 1970s Exxon was building up considerable strength in the field of advanced electronics. By the turn of the decade it was already marketing word processors, electronic typewriters, and facsimile transmission devices (64), after acquiring half a dozen small high-technology companies (65) under the aegis of its Exxon Enterprises subsidiary.
But it was not until 1979 that the writing was clearly on the (office) wall, when it bid for Reliance Electric, in order to consolidate commercial exploitation of its alternative current synthesizer (ACS).
ACS was trumpeted as a device that would control the speed of electric motors by altering the frequency and voltage of ordinary mains electricity, primarily for motors between 1000 and 2000 horse-power, but also giving "energy savings in heating, ventilation and air conditioning" (64). Reliance Electric was not only the biggest producer of electrically operated vehicles, but also a large manufacturer of electrical motors, power transmission equipment and telecommunications equipment (64).
Exxon paid US$ 1.2 billion for Reliance, only to be met with political opposition (66) and a charge of "reducing competition" by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Although cleared by the FTC three years later (67), by then the ACS scheme had run into mounting difficulties, with costs and "reliability problems" under heavy scrutiny (68) . In 1986 Exxon sold off Reliance after a foray which "looked increasingly ill-advised" (69). Thus ended "perhaps the most costly and extraordinary diversification plan proposed by any of the oil majors ... to exploit a technical breakthrough in electrical motor design" (70).
Unfortunately, Exxon has not so easily let go its plans to exploit synthetic fuels, in particular oil shale - a key part of President Carter's energy independence programme in the late 1970s which, theoretically, promises self-sufficiency in oil for 75 years, from deposits in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming alone (71). It also promises open-pit mines creating "vast gashes on the countryside three miles long by one-and-a-half miles wide" (71).
The company laid out its synfuel plans in a report entitled The Role of synthetic fuel in the US energy future published in 1980. That report acknowledged that profitability could be affected by "costly environmental standards" but projected oil shale as "by far the largest part of the programme", followed by the liquefaction and gasification of coal (72). (At the same time, Exxon's research unit funded an MIT study into the burning of coal, coal liquefaction, shale oil and heavy crude petroleum - the results were not expected until 1990) (73).
After that, Exxon invested heavily in the Colony, Parachute, Colorado oil shale project, 60% of which it bought from Arco in 1980 at a cost of US$400 million (74) and was "bankrolling" to the tune of US$3.56 million the following year (69). However, it backed out of Colony the following year (an example of "decolonisation"?) (75). But it beat CRA, BHP, and BP (among others) in the bid for a lion's share of the Rundle oil shale deposits in Queensland, Australia, (76) a JV which it shares with Southern Pacific Petroleum and Central Pacific Minerals. In 1980 a large new deposit was discovered at Rundle, promising 2.02 billion barrels of oil, at 40 litres per tonne cut-off. Early predictions that Rundle could be in petroleum production by 1984 and provide as much as 25% of Australia's domestic petroleum requirements (77) were over-optimistic. In 1984, the Rundle agreement had to be renegotiated (78) but reportedly "satisfactory" development continued through 1986 (79).
Exxon's Allsands project at Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada, currently produces around 20,000 barrels of oil per day. Exxon (Imperial Oil) dithered considerably, after Shell Canada pulled out in 1982 (80) and costs escalated (81). By 1985, a C$4 million expansion programme had been proposed, raising the company's capital expenditure at Cold Lake to C$1000 million and its output to 90 thousand barrels a day by 1988 (82). However, approval for this was still required from the Energy Resources Conservation Board (83).
Through Imperial Oil, Exxon also holds a stake in the Syncrude project in the Athabasca region of north-east Alberta - one of Canada's two commercial oil-sands projects (32).
Exxon began mining uranium in the 196Os and its involvement has continued to the present day (12), even though its uranium and nuclear fuel fabrication interests have proved consistent financial losers (2). Uranium
Exxon Nuclear Company was founded in 1969 to manage and market nuclear products and services and consolidate the inroads the company had already made into nuclear fuel provision. As with its entree into coal, Exxon made a clean sweep - hiring staff, purchasing leases and equipment - from the ground up, and using the best personnel available from the nuclear industry, national laboratories and the universities (2).
Within a decade Exxon Nuclear had spent some US$200 million, was employing 800 "highly-qualified personnel" and had mapped out plans for potential investment of some US$2.1 billion by the turn of the century, most of it on the development of an enrichment plant and reprocessing plant (84). Based in Richland, Washington (site of much war-time development of nuclear weapons), by the late 1970s the Exxon enrichment project had started assembling and testing its first superspeed enrichment centrifuges, with a view to developing a 3000 tonnes of SWU (separative work unit) capacity (84). Plans for a reprocessing plant - the only ones finally submitted to ERDA for approval - envisaged operations at Exxon's site near the ERDA Reservation (sic) in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, as starting in 1986, providing political hurdles were overcome first (84). In 1981, Exxon planned to spend US$13.5 billion on new capital projects with "nuclear" as a priority (85).
In fact, over the following decade, Exxon has abandoned its plans to build a separate ultracentrifuge enrichment plant, and plans for a reprocessing plant are on the back-burner. Nonetheless, Exxon Nuclear has pioneered development of laser-enrichment, a technology which as described by its inventor, Dr Karl Cohen of Exxon - promises 100% "no waste" enrichment of uranium (12, 86); and together with Arco, it is a manufacturer of nuclear fuel assemblies (12). In 1986, Siemens of West Germany was holding talks with Exxon Nuclear, to gain access to its fuel elements, their technology and transfer, and possibly a stake in the US operations (87).
While the company's grand design for uranium production has also taken a nose-dive - leaving only Esso Resources Canada's 50% stake in the extremely promising Midwest Lake JV in Saskatchewan as a viable project for the future Exxon continues to play a crucial role in the provision of uranium for US utilities. While it is not known exactly which utilities have contracted with Exxon over the past twenty years, four of them - Duquesne Light Co, Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co, the Ohio Edison Co and the Toledo Edison Co, (the Central Area Power Co-ordination Group) - in 1979 filed suit against Exxon Nuclear for alleged failure to deliver uranium concentrates (88).
Between 1983 and 1989 Exxon contracted for 2,000,000 pounds of uranium equivalent per year from Gencor (89), probably to be enriched by BNFL (90) and possibly destined for the Boston Edison Company - though Boston Edison itself has contracts for uranium supply from Palabora, the RTZ-managed mine in South Africa.
Exxon first struck yellow oil with the discovery of one of the largest uranium deposits in the US in 1968. By 1972 the Highland mine and mill in Wyoming were in operation (2) with 2000 tons per day throughput of ore (91). An underground mine was later developed, and by 1980 this mine was accounting for nearly one-tenth (9%) of total US uranium production (2). By then Exxon was the third biggest uranium producer in the country (2) and had 10% of US milling capacity (92).
This was not all. The company was already mining uranium in Texas (93) and, in short order, had the following projects underway:
In Western Australia, a deal agreed with Western Mining Corporation (WMC) and UG for a 15% interest in the Yeelirrie mine (94, 95). Esso Exploration and Production Australia Ltd was its operating arm (96). A year later Esso Australia also took a 51% stake in the Pandanus Creek JV with Otter and Carr Boyd. It was also expressing interest in acquiring a stake in Roxby Downs (see WMC) (95) and exploring in the Northern Territory (97).
A uranium search in the Seaward Peninsula of Alaska (98). In South Africa (along with US Steel) an exploration programme started in the late 1970s (100). Exploring for Uranium in Arizona (99)
A search started in 1978 by Esso AG in Bavaria, east of Nuremberg, at the Fichtelgebirge mountain range, bordering on Czechoslovakia, with plans to sink a shaft to test commercial viability (101). Costs were set at L8.9 million, but five times this was estimated as necessary for production (102). By the mid- 1980s test drilling had revealed some 80 potential uranium lodes (103).
Esso Minerals Niger Inc took out sizeable claims in the Tazole area near Techili (104). It also had a JV with Onarem (105).
Exxon contracted a deal with Kerr-McGee to process 500 tons/day of its South Powder River uranium deposit in Wyoming (106).
It drilled near West Milford, in Passaic County, New Jersey (107).
By early May 1979 (along with Arco/Anaconda and Phillips) Exxon secured potential uranium leases (two or three dozen in all) in Norman County, and four leases in Mahnomen county, Minnesota (108).
Drilling also started in Michigan around the same time (169).
It obtained three leases in the Grand Canyon, thanks to the US National Park Service, and despite the Park Service itself rejecting an Exxon application (the access roads alone would "irreparably scar the land") (109).
It made sizeable uranium claims on land just east of Cerillo and south of Sante Fe, New Mexico (also near claims made by Union Carbide and Lone Star Mining) (110). This is presumed to be the same lease of 60,000 acres of Laguna Pueblo lands in which Exxon had gained an 87.5% interest in 1976 and located an estimated 6 million pounds of U308 (111).
The company negotiated in 1974, and amended in 1976, an exploration permit and mining lease for uranium on a huge tract of Navajo land in New Mexico, approval for which was granted by the Secretary of the Interior in early 1977 (112). Exxon got the right to seek out uranium over 400,000 acres, of which just over 50,000 could be set aside for mining (113).
This vast acreage was not all: a year later, Exxon leased the entire Canoncito Band Navajo reservation of about 92,000 acres (114). With the acquisition of these leases - in the same area near Shiprock where the majority of Navajo and white miners contracted cancer from Kerr-McGee's operations in the 1950s and 1960s (115) - Exxon in the late 1970s became by far the largest holder of uranium leases in the San Juan belt (116).
At another 2.5-acre site in the San Juan region, on the L-Bar ranch, east of Mount Taylor where Exxon had a 60,000 acre lease, the company planned to adopt a uranium leaching process used in Texas and Wyoming. The company's application mentioned simply a "small-scale in situ project ... needed to allow the feasibility of a large-scale in situ mining operation to be evaluated" (117).
By 1978, high incidences of uranium were reported in the copper-zinc lode on Exxon's Crandon prospect in Wisconsin. Although the company refused to indicate its interest in uranium by-product extraction, the Center for Alternative Mining Development Policy (CAMDP) raised the issue with the state government (and was pointedly ignored) (118), and calculated that Exxon might be able to leach no less than 17 million pounds of uranium oxide from the deposit - without a separate EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) being required (119). In 1980 Exxon also leased uranium rights to a large area (which includes the west end of Crandon), from Chicago Northwestern Railroad (120) at Forest River.
Ironically, Exxon's largest uranium losses in this period were recorded in 1978 - at a time when prices were highest (2). The spate of exploration projects announced in the late 1970s - perhaps designed at locating some magically rich, low-cost deposit, couldn't save Exxon's uranium programme. In 1979, a secret Exxon study concluded that there was no economic advantage in nuclear as against coal power (121), and in 1980, when the price of uranium slumped to its lowest for many years (122), Exxon announced plans to shut its operating mines by 1983 (123).
By then, Exxon's stay in the town of Douglas, Wyoming - near its two operating Wyoming mines - looked like being distinctly over- extended since it had not co-operated in funding local projects (124); its Highland tailings dam was leaking and repair efforts reportedly failing (125); extremely adverse radiation effects on fauna and flora near the mine were being reported by Dr Garth Kennington of the University of Wyoming - only to be ignored by the company (126).
In July 1980, the Wisconsin Legislative Council set up a sub-committee on uranium exploration safety, at which local groups demanded a moratorium. Exxon and Kerr-McGee refused to attend the preliminary hearings (127).
A year later, officials in Midway Township, Minnesota, denied Exxon permission to drill in the area (128).
Also in 1981, New Jersey banned uranium mining for seven years - a move which primarily affected Sohio, but also Exxon's claims in Passaic country (129).
A trans-European Stop Uranium Mining conference held in Fichtelgebirge, West Germany, and attended by at least forty local people, specifically condemned Esso AG's uranium testing on their lands (130).
In 1982, Atlas Corp bought up Exxon's uranium properties at Bulldog, in Garfield County, Utah - a very high-grade deposit with significant incidences of uranium, where preparations were already in hand to construct a processing plant (55).
The same year, Exxon sold its 15% interest in Yeelirrie, Western Australia (131). The company stated that mining would not be economically viable under the terms of the JV agreement or its assessment of the market outlook. The announcement - greeted by WMC chair Arvi Parbo as a "major blow" (132) - followed Esso's announcement that it would take an additional 35% interest in Yeelirrie, a measure agreed to by the Federal Investment Review Board, despite its violating its own guidelines (133).
Finally, in 1983, as Exxon phased out its Wyoming operations "because of depleted reserves" (134), Everest Minerals of Texas agreed to buy most of Exxon's assets on the project, as well as its in situ pilot plant, while Wold Nuclear Corp of Casper, Wyoming, took over the 7000 acres of Exxon's unmined properties in the area (134).
With the close of 1983, Exxon's brash, two-decade foray into yellowcake was clearly coming to an end, at least on mainland USA.
Exxon's operations in Ecuador (along with those of many other corporations, including Elf Aquitaine, Conoco, Occidental and BP) have caused considerable concern to human rights and indigenous support groups. Five main Indian peoples are affected by these encroachments on their lands in the Amazonian region of the country - the Quichua, Waorani, Cofan, Siona and Secoya (135). The encroachments started in the 1960s and intensified in the 1970s, driving out indigenous game, polluting the river with oil spills and destroying the fish (136). In July 1987, two missionaries, attempting to make contact with Waorani by landing in an oil company helicopter, were killed by the Indians. Commenting on this tragic error, Survival International stated: "Oil exploration and the subsequent colonisation is without a doubt the major problem faced by Amazonian Indians in Ecuador". It asked the President of Ecuador to respect Indian lands and ensure that companies like Exxon withdrew immediately from Waorani land (137). Indigenous Peoples
Esso's operations in Alaska and (through Esso Resources Canada) in northern Canada have long had a major impact on indigenous peoples in the region. In 1981 the Reagan administration voted to allow Exxon, together with Arco and Sohio, to go ahead with their plans for a 4800-mile natural gas pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to the northern mainland USA (138). (For details, see Arco entry in the File). But it is Exxon's operations in the Beaufort sea, and the so-called North Slope, which have most alarmed the Inuit and Dene. Esso's partners in these ventures have once again been Arco and Sohio, with Gulf (see the Gulf entry in the File). It was only in the mid- 1980s that further large-scale exploration of the region began to fall off, with the plunge in the price of oil (139).
In some contrast to the off-hand approach Esso/Exxon has adopted with regard to the Inuit of the Beaufort Sea and the Indians of Ecuador, Esso Resources has forged what is widely credited as being a "unique" alliance with some indigenous peoples in the MacKenzie river delta. Through the seventies, the expanding Norman Wells pipeline and oilfields threatened the "livelihood and future" of the Dene in the North-West Territories of Canada (140). Then, in 1981, Esso announced that in order to draw oil from the remaining wells at Norman Wells - right under the bed of the MacKenzie river - it would build six artificial islands. Both the Dene Nation and the Department of the Environment criticised the proposals, fearing that an oil spill would obliterate all marine life in the region. "Don't play god with our lives or our livelihood," demanded Chief T'Sellie of Fort Good Hope (140) . "It is beyond belief that this project has passed environmental assessment," he added, envisaging that one major spill could destroy much of the moose, musk-rat, beaver, as well as millions of fish, on which the people depend. Within the next two years, however, the Dene began discussing a joint venture with Esso, thus "changing a position the Dene have held the last fifteen years or so" (141). Meanwhile Esso itself was "cleaning up its.act", with the adoption of oil spill contamination control measures which it claimed were virtually foolproof. These were developed with the assistance of Fort Good Dene and a consultant helping the band (142). By then Esso had reduced the number of islands to four - constructed in 1982 and early 1983 - and was allowing representatives of the indigenous inhabitants to monitor their performance (143). The same year, Shehtah Drilling was established as a partnership between the Dene and Metis and Esso, with a 2-year agreement during which the native people's loans would be repaid. Shehtah Drilling operated on the Dehcho island rig, and half its workforce was drawn from the Dene and Metis peoples (144). Even so, by 1986 the Dene were criticising the lack of training given workers on the Norman Wells project, and calling for "impact funding" of US$10.5M to be given directly to the people (145).
Exxon's companies have "a long history of involvement in exploration on Aboriginal land in Australia, dating back to the early 1970s when negotiations to undertake uranium exploration near Oenpelli in Arnhem Land were conducted" - and an agreement signed with the Oenpelli people (5). However, it has been praised for its sensitivity towards Aboriginal land rights demands (146) and its formal policy, as expressed in Esso Australia's submission to the WA Aboriginal Land Enquiry, goes further than almost any other mining company.
Esso has pledged to ensure that the "important and unique culture and traditions of the Aboriginal people" be "respected by Esso employees and reflected in the mode of company operations". It promises to brief its employees on Aboriginal history and traditions, demanding they respect Aboriginal traditions, culture and customs. It has also promised to respect sacred sites and sites of significance and to keep Aboriginal groups informed of activities potentially or actually affecting them (5).
In the Northern Territory (NT) in particular, Esso has had "numerous contacts with Aboriginal communities and Land Councils", including negotiating protection of sacred sites in the Nicholson River Land Claim area in 1979 and (until exploration stopped in 1981) consultations with the Aboriginal Sacred Sites Protection Authority at Daly River Stage Two Land Claim area, and a similar contact in the Banka Banka-Renner Springs area in 1982 (5).
During exploration of the Arafura Sea it negotiated navigation facilities and a helicopter landing pad in the Murgenella Reserve in 1983. Thereafter it stopped exploration of the NT.
In Western Australia (WA) its oil exploration leases affecting Aboriginal land are EP110 (on the Peedamulla pastoral lease near Onslow), EP104 over Dampier Land Peninsula, which includes the Beagle Bay reserve and Mowanjum mission (Esso 58.33% share), and the Lake Gregory pastoral leases and Balwina Reserve in central WA, where Esso has a 30% share while Pioneer Concrete has 14%.
At Harbour Lights, Esso signed an agreement with the Leonora Aboriginal community in 1984, while its explorations west of the Darling River, started in 1981, have involved extensive consultations with Aboriginal groups and occupants (5).
During this period, unfortunately, the parent company embarked on a project which has become a text-book demonstration of how corporate entities should not behave with indigenous people.
Exxon's copper-zinc deposit, discovered at Crandon, Wisconsin, in 1976, followed in the wake of a corporate "metals rush" in which around forty companies were involved (147). Exxon's prize was undoubtedly the most handsome: the location of what could be the world's largest such lode, yielding up to 125 million tons of ore (148): costs could reach US$1400 million (93) while a 600-acre site would be required for waste pond and treatment plant alone (148).
By 1977, the company had already drilled 2000 feet down at Crandon (149).
The deposit lies just two miles west of the Chippewa Sokoagon Reservation at Mole Lake, a community whose original 10,000-acre treaty lands were forfeited when an 1854 treaty was lost in a shipwreck. Although assigned a pitiful tract of land in 1937, the Sokoagon's reservation surrounds one of the most important wild rice stands in the region. The Mole Lake reservation was designed to give the people control forever of this wild rice, the water resources of Swamp Creek, and wildlife (150).
In October 1976, the Sokoagon turned down Exxon's derisory offer of US$20,000 for a mineral exploration lease, and laid claim to an area including the Crandon deposit (150).
Within the next four years, they linked up with other indigenous peoples, the Potawatomi, Oneida, Winnebago and, in particular, the Menominee, whose own reservation fifty miles downstream of Swamp Creek would be threatened by mercury, cadmium and lead pollution from the mining (151). At a conference in summer 1980, they were supported by Indians from throughout the US and Canada (152). After pressure on Exxon forced the company to finally meet with indigenous landholders (153), using funding from the state of Wisconsin the Sokoagon employed a research group, COACT, to evaluate the social, economic and environmental impact of the mine (150). COACT's report questioned the wisdom of underground miningperse, criticised Exxon for failing to make any "concrete commitments ... concerning job and training strategies" and asserted the right of the people to form their own businesses as "the only sure route to economic self-sufficiency" (154).
The COACT Report forced Exxon to put back its plans for about a year (148). Meanwhile, the company cancelled the prospecting stage of the mine, saving US$30 million, and attempting to advance construction by three years. Exxon claimed that a state tax of up to 20% on net proceeds over US$30 million "severely reduced" the mine's economic viability; if the laws were changed, mining could "possibly begin in 1984" (155). In fact, there is good reason to believe that, if uranium were mined as a by-product at Crandon, the tax would not be insuperable (156), and in late 1981 state moves were made to reduce the tax (157).
In 1982, Exxon filed for a mining permit with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR); that year the Sokoagon Chippea, Menominee and Potwatomi tribes formed a Tri-Tribal Mining Impact committee, followed by the Wisconsin Resources Protection Council (WRPC) whose aim was to mobilise individual townships to oppose a 1981 measure permitting ground water contamination from mining (158).
At the end of that year, the Sinsinwa Dominican Sisters of Wisconsin entered a stockholder resolution at Exxon's AGM, demanding postponement of Crandon until Chippewa treaty claims had been settled. Supported by Indian delegates, the resolution got 2.5% of the vote, representing more than 16 million shares (158). Three years later, Exxon downgraded Crandon, envisaging a somewhat smaller operation in the light of adverse economic conditions (159).
Finally (we hope), in early 1987, Exxon decided to discontinue searching for a permit to mine at Mole Lake - a nice way of saying it has put the project on the shelf. Although it gave economic reasons as the main justification, there is no doubt that the hundreds of meetings organised around the issue, prompted by an almost uniquely successful Indian/white, indigenous/conservationist lobbying process, were a key factor (160).
Exxon's dealings with the Navaho nation, although conducted during the same period as attempted to get the Crandon mine underway, were markedly more favourable to the traditional owners and land users. The Navaho-Exxon lease - almost certainly the biggest single uranium lease in contemporary USA - covered 625 square miles and stretches from Shiprock in the north almost to Toadlena in the south. Negotiations between the company and the tribal council, led by Peter MacDonald (the architect of the much-criticised CERT, or Council of Energy Resource Tribes), lasted about three years, during which the Navajos considered three options: a straight royalty payment based on production; a JV with the Navajos contributing up to 49% of the costs and capital, receiving 49% of future profits; an up-to-49% non- working interest, with Exxon paying the capital costs, and the Navajos repaying 200% of the costs out of the future net profits (161). The US Department of the Interior estimated that option two was likely to be the most profitable - bringing in between US$49M and US$71M over a ten-year span (162). The Navajo nation would be paid US$6M for exploration rights (91), and would not be held liable for the project's failure (163).
Exxon's offer was widely hailed as unique, while one mining spokesman (Homestake) found the idea of paying (a mere bribe??) several million just "for the right to find something" distinctly "shocking" (91).
Seventeen Navajos went to court to try to prevent the agreement going ahead, when official approval for exploration was granted in early 1977 (113), and other native American groups vehemently opposed the leasing of a huge chunk of the largest remaining indigenous reservation in the USA, for the most dangerous of all forms of mining. Various Navajos pointed out the physical damage that the mine - albeit on "only" 5120 acres out of the 400,000 acreage - would cause, especially to sacred sites such as the Pena Blanca Canyon (109). A social worker for the Shiprock Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Agency claimed Exxon would pull out of the project if it had to bear the real costs of social and environmental disruption (109). The Bureau of Indian Affairs, in its own EIS, pointed out that there was to be no job preference for Navajo workers, nor special housing or transportation measures. It summarised the likely environmental impacts with admirable succinctness:
"Impacts resulting from exploration will include disturbances of soil and vegetation and air quality degradation resulting from the vehicular movement and the operation of drilling equipment. If mining and milling takes place significant environmental impacts include: sub-surface water depletion, soil and vegetation disturbance, air quality degradation, interruption of the wildlife habitat, population increases, increased demands on community services and facilities, and disruption of established lifestyles and social patterns. Low levels of radioactive emissions will be found at mine and mill sites."Moreover, in granting permission to explore, the Department of the Interior waived no less than thirteen regulations (164,112).
The best that can be said for this agreement is that it established a precedent which could be followed by native Americans should they be in favour of a mineral project. At its worst it became a divisive factor within the Navajo nation and, indeed, probably contributed to the removal of Peter Macdonald as chairman of the Navajo Nation in the early 1980s. (He was later reelected.)
By the late 1980s, Exxon's rank as the world's biggest industrial concern had slipped. (In 1987 it was ranked second in the Fortune 500, behind General Motors. However, General Motors has nothing like the global spread of Exxon) (170). It also lagged behind Royal Dutch/Shell in terms of worldwide oil and gas revenues and resources (170) and by the following year, was trailing BP (171).
The Valdez disaster of March 1989, although not the largest oil spill in history, suddenly thrust the corporation into the public spotlight around the world as it was arraigned on five criminal counts by a Federal Grand Jury in the USA (172), bombarded by environmental organisations (173), and castigated by the citizens of Alaska who were the victims of the million gallon "spill" (174). The USA's largest pension fund tried to oust the entire Exxon board because of its failure to take preventative action against future similar disasters (175).
Even while Exxon was facing-out the massive criticism of its failures in Alaska, and defying a demand by the Alaska State House of Representatives for speedier payments of compensation, clean-up costs and criminal penalties (176), it was being accused of illegally shipping hazardous wastes to a treatment plant in Alaska (177). The year before, an underwater Exxon pipeline at Baytown, New Jersey, ruptured, releasing more than half a million gallons of heating oil into the Arthur Kill waterway (178). Allegedly Exxon for years had "file[d] reports... that falsely indicated that the company's leak detection system in the Arthur Kill was in good working order" (179).
The same year, the company settled US$11 million on around 200 residents of Highlands, Texas who claimed widespread illness (including high rates of cancer) due to the nearby Liberty Waste dumpsite, where they believed illegal toxics were being deposited (180).
Meanwhile, as the Valdez monstrosity continued to grab the headlines (justifiably so, considering that more than a quarter of a million birds died as a result (181) and possibly many more) (182), Exxon's mining interests continued to give cause for considerable alarm.
In 1989, Exxon sustained the worst mine safety record among the 20 largest underground producers in the USA (183).
Worldwide, by the beginning of 1990, Exxon was ranked first among multinationals as a coal producer/reserves holder (184).
Its major projects remained the Disputada mine in Chile (now usually known as Los Bronces) which underwent an expansion in late 1990 (185) despite a US$51 million net loss in 1986 (186), and the El Cerrejon project in Colombia.
In late 1988, the Los Bronces mine shut down for one month when a diversionary tunnel, intended to divert melted water from the Mapocho river (which flows through Santiago), got plugged. Since the "episode" occurred only two weeks after a major mudslide to the south of Santiago swept away a construction camp (not an Exxon responsibility) with the loss of 30 lives, it caused "considerable public consternation" - to quote the Engineering and Mining Journal (185).
The Cerrejon mine - the largest in Colombia, with intended production of 60 million tonnes a year by the turn of the century (187) - has also been the subject of considerable consternation. Although not one of the notorious Colombian exploiters of child labour, no less than 32 workers have died during work at the mine in the period since 1986, from causes which are still not understood (188).
In May 1990, 3800 workers at the company's Guajira mine (managed by its subsidiary Intercor) went on strike, after Exxon refused to negotiate improved housing, a shorter working week, and better working conditions. The government responded by declaring the strike illegal (189). Walter Castillo, president of the Intercor Worker's Union, declared that the company's behaviour was " ... completely arrogant ... What we are saying to Exxon is: We are human beings. You must stop trying to block the elemental desire of every human being to satifsy their basic needs, improve working conditions and move forward" (189).
Finally it is worth remembering that, prompted by the Alaskan disaster, several major environmental organisations and socially responsible shareholder groups have been demanding that US corporations adopt what are now known as the "Valdez Principles". To date, no corporation (including Exxon) has done so.
We will minimise and strive to eliminate the release of any pollutant that may cause environmental damage to the air, water or earth or its inhabitants. We will safeguard habitats in rivers, lakes, wetlands, coastal zones and oceans and will minimise contributing to the greenhouse effect, depletion of the ozone layer, acid rain or smog. Extracts from the Valdez Principles
We will minimise the creation of waste, and wherever possible recycle materials. We will dispose of all wastes through safe and responsible methods.
We will minimise the environmental, health and safety risks to our employees and the communities in which we operate, by employing safe technologies and operating procedures and by being constantly prepared for emergencies.
We will sell products or services that minimise adverse environmental impacts and that are safe as consumers commonly use them. We will inform consumers of the environmental impacts of our products and services.
We will take responsibility for any harm we cause the environment by making every effort to fully restore the environment and to compensate those persons who are adversely affected.
We will disclose to our employees and to the public, incidents relating to our operations that cause environmental harm or pose health or safety risks.
We will commit management resources to implement the Valdez Principles, to monitor and report upon our implementation efforts, and to sustain a process to ensure that the board of directors and chief executive officer are kept informed of, and are fully responsible for, all environmental matters.
We will conduct and make public an annual self-evaluation of our progress in implementing these principles and in complying with with laws and regulations throughout our worldwide operations. We will work towards the timely creation of independent audit procedures, which we will complete annually and make available to the public (190).
Apart from the examples of curbs on Exxon's power already mentioned in this entry, the following are worth noting: Footnote
In 1986, Exxon was fined US$2 billion by the US Treasury for overcharging for oil sales in the US - the largest civil judgement awarded in the country's history (165). This followed an order by a US federal judge in 1985 that the company should repay US$895 million it had overcharged in a Texan oil field (166).
In Malaysia in 1980, Esso Production Malaysia was accused of taking (stealing) 23,000 barrels of oil in excess of limits imposed by the government, as well as shoddy work paid by the country's oil revenues (167).
US domestic copper producers petitioned the US government in 1984 to limit the import of Exxon copper from Chile, in order to preserve their own interests. Exxon countered that the high US costs resulted from "high wages, low-quality ore, environmental controls and the strength of the US dollar" (168).
A basic introduction to the origins, growth, conceits and deceits of Standard Oil/Exxon - together with interesting vignettes of all members of the Rockefeller clan - is Peter Collier and David Horowitz's The Rockefellers, An American Dynasty (Signet New York, 1976). See also "The Rockefeller Empire" in Lords of the Realm, No. 1, (Pommedor Publications, London, undated). Further Reading:
On South America: "The Rockefeller Empire: Latin America", NACLA Newsletter, April, May, June 1979.
On Cerrejon: "The Great Colombian Coal Conundrum" FT 4/1/84; "Cerrejon Coal for Colombia" E&MJ 4/85 (pp 32J-32N); "Yo Hablo a Caracas" Sewithel and Stülher, in Pogrom GfbV, Göttingen, No. 129, 3/87.
On Los Bronces: "Exxon trims Chile copper plans to fit cost escalation" E&MJ, 2/85 (pp 26-32).
On Crandon and Uranium in Wisconsin: Al Gedicks, "Exxon, copper and the Sokoagon; Tightening the corporate grip in Chippewa country", The Progressive, US, Feb. 1980 (pp 43-46); "Exxon and the Recolonisation of Wisconsin and Chile" CALA Newsletter, Vol 7, No. 3, Madison, Feb. 1979.
Contact:
Arbeitskreis Uranabbau, c/o Gertrud Winkler, Bahnofstr 37, 8664 Stammbach, Germany.
Center for ALternative Mining Development Policy, 210 Avon Street, La Crosse, Wisconsin 54603, USA.
Multinationals and Development Clearinghouse, P.O. Box 19405, Washington DC, 20036, USA.
SOURCE: "The Gulliver File - Mines, people and land: a global battleground" by Roger Moody.
Published in 1992 by Minewatch, 218 Liverpool Road, London Nl ILE, UK, and WISE-Glen Aplin, Po Box 87, Glen Aplin Q 4381, Australia.
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