Nigeria's oil spills worse than Guf spill, also ignored

[wautd]

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Nigeria's agony dwarfs the Gulf oil spill. The US and Europe ignore it

The Deepwater Horizon disaster caused headlines around the world, yet the people who live in the Niger delta have had to live with environmental catastrophes for decades

We reached the edge of the oil spill near the Nigerian village of Otuegwe after a long hike through cassava plantations. Ahead of us lay swamp. We waded into the warm tropical water and began swimming, cameras and notebooks held above our heads. We could smell the oil long before we saw it – the stench of garage forecourts and rotting vegetation hanging thickly in the air.

The farther we travelled, the more nauseous it became. Soon we were swimming in pools of light Nigerian crude, the best-quality oil in the world. One of the many hundreds of 40-year-old pipelines that crisscross the Niger delta had corroded and spewed oil for several months.

Forest and farmland were now covered in a sheen of greasy oil. Drinking wells were polluted and people were distraught. No one knew how much oil had leaked. "We lost our nets, huts and fishing pots," said Chief Promise, village leader of Otuegwe and our guide. "This is where we fished and farmed. We have lost our forest. We told Shell of the spill within days, but they did nothing for six months."

That was the Niger delta a few years ago, where, according to Nigerian academics, writers and environment groups, oil companies have acted with such impunity and recklessness that much of the region has been devastated by leaks.

In fact, more oil is spilled from the delta's network of terminals, pipes, pumping stations and oil platforms every year than has been lost in the Gulf of Mexico, the site of a major ecological catastrophe caused by oil that has poured from a leak triggered by the explosion that wrecked BP's Deepwater Horizon rig last month.

That disaster, which claimed the lives of 11 rig workers, has made headlines round the world. By contrast, little information has emerged about the damage inflicted on the Niger delta. Yet the destruction there provides us with a far more accurate picture of the price we have to pay for drilling oil today.

On 1 May this year a ruptured ExxonMobil pipeline in the state of Akwa Ibom spilled more than a million gallons into the delta over seven days before the leak was stopped. Local people demonstrated against the company but say they were attacked by security guards. Community leaders are now demanding $1bn in compensation for the illness and loss of livelihood they suffered. Few expect they will succeed. In the meantime, thick balls of tar are being washed up along the coast.

Within days of the Ibeno spill, thousands of barrels of oil were spilled when the nearby Shell Trans Niger pipeline was attacked by rebels. A few days after that, a large oil slick was found floating on Lake Adibawa in Bayelsa state and another in Ogoniland. "We are faced with incessant oil spills from rusty pipes, some of which are 40 years old," said Bonny Otavie, a Bayelsa MP.

This point was backed by Williams Mkpa, a community leader in Ibeno: "Oil companies do not value our life; they want us to all die. In the past two years, we have experienced 10 oil spills and fishermen can no longer sustain their families. It is not tolerable."

With 606 oilfields, the Niger delta supplies 40% of all the crude the United States imports and is the world capital of oil pollution. Life expectancy in its rural communities, half of which have no access to clean water, has fallen to little more than 40 years over the past two generations. Locals blame the oil that pollutes their land and can scarcely believe the contrast with the steps taken by BP and the US government to try to stop the Gulf oil leak and to protect the Louisiana shoreline from pollution.

"If this Gulf accident had happened in Nigeria, neither the government nor the company would have paid much attention," said the writer Ben Ikari, a member of the Ogoni people. "This kind of spill happens all the time in the delta."

"The oil companies just ignore it. The lawmakers do not care and people must live with pollution daily. The situation is now worse than it was 30 years ago. Nothing is changing. When I see the efforts that are being made in the US I feel a great sense of sadness at the double standards. What they do in the US or in Europe is very different."

"We see frantic efforts being made to stop the spill in the US," said Nnimo Bassey, Nigerian head of Friends of the Earth International. "But in Nigeria, oil companies largely ignore their spills, cover them up and destroy people's livelihood and environments. The Gulf spill can be seen as a metaphor for what is happening daily in the oilfields of Nigeria and other parts of Africa.

"This has gone on for 50 years in Nigeria. People depend completely on the environment for their drinking water and farming and fishing. They are amazed that the president of the US can be making speeches daily, because in Nigeria people there would not hear a whimper," he said.

It is impossible to know how much oil is spilled in the Niger delta each year because the companies and the government keep that secret. However, two major independent investigations over the past four years suggest that as much is spilled at sea, in the swamps and on land every year as has been lost in the Gulf of Mexico so far.

One report, compiled by WWF UK, the World Conservation Union and representatives from the Nigerian federal government and the Nigerian Conservation Foundation, calculated in 2006 that up to 1.5m tons of oil – 50 times the pollution unleashed in the Exxon Valdez tanker disaster in Alaska – has been spilled in the delta over the past half century. Last year Amnesty calculated that the equivalent of at least 9m barrels of oil was spilled and accused the oil companies of a human rights outrage.

According to Nigerian federal government figures, there were more than 7,000 spills between 1970 and 2000, and there are 2,000 official major spillages sites, many going back decades, with thousands of smaller ones still waiting to be cleared up. More than 1,000 spill cases have been filed against Shell alone.

Last month Shell admitted to spilling 14,000 tonnes of oil in 2009. The majority, said the company, was lost through two incidents – one in which the company claims that thieves damaged a wellhead at its Odidi field and another where militants bombed the Trans Escravos pipeline.

Shell, which works in partnership with the Nigerian government in the delta, says that 98% of all its oil spills are caused by vandalism, theft or sabotage by militants and only a minimal amount by deteriorating infrastructure. "We had 132 spills last year, as against 175 on average. Safety valves were vandalised; one pipe had 300 illegal taps. We found five explosive devices on one. Sometimes communities do not give us access to clean up the pollution because they can make more money from compensation," said a spokesman.

"We have a full-time oil spill response team. Last year we replaced 197 miles of pipeline and are using every known way to clean up pollution, including microbes. We are committed to cleaning up any spill as fast as possible as soon as and for whatever reason they occur."

These claims are hotly disputed by communities and environmental watchdog groups. They mostly blame the companies' vast network of rusting pipes and storage tanks, corroding pipelines, semi-derelict pumping stations and old wellheads, as well as tankers and vessels cleaning out tanks.

The scale of the pollution is mind-boggling. The government's national oil spill detection and response agency (Nosdra) says that between 1976 and 1996 alone, more than 2.4m barrels contaminated the environment. "Oil spills and the dumping of oil into waterways has been extensive, often poisoning drinking water and destroying vegetation. These incidents have become common due to the lack of laws and enforcement measures within the existing political regime," said a spokesman for Nosdra.

The sense of outrage is widespread. "There are more than 300 spills, major and minor, a year," said Bassey. "It happens all the year round. The whole environment is devastated. The latest revelations highlight the massive difference in the response to oil spills. In Nigeria, both companies and government have come to treat an extraordinary level of oil spills as the norm."

A spokesman for the Stakeholder Democracy Network in Lagos, which works to empower those in communities affected by the oil companies' activities, said: "The response to the spill in the United States should serve as a stiff reminder as to how far spill management in Nigeria has drifted from standards across the world."

Other voices of protest point out that the world has overlooked the scale of the environmental impact. Activist Ben Amunwa, of the London-based oil watch group Platform, said: "Deepwater Horizon may have exceed Exxon Valdez, but within a few years in Nigeria offshore spills from four locations dwarfed the scale of the Exxon Valdez disaster many times over. Estimates put spill volumes in the Niger delta among the worst on the planet, but they do not include the crude oil from waste water and gas flares. Companies such as Shell continue to avoid independent monitoring and keep key data secret."

Worse may be to come. One industry insider, who asked not to be named, said: "Major spills are likely to increase in the coming years as the industry strives to extract oil from increasingly remote and difficult terrains. Future supplies will be offshore, deeper and harder to work. When things go wrong, it will be harder to respond."

Judith Kimerling, a professor of law and policy at the City University of New York and author of Amazon Crude, a book about oil development in Ecuador, said: "Spills, leaks and deliberate discharges are happening in oilfields all over the world and very few people seem to care."

There is an overwhelming sense that the big oil companies act as if they are beyond the law. Bassey said: "What we conclude from the Gulf of Mexico pollution incident is that the oil companies are out of control.

"It is clear that BP has been blocking progressive legislation, both in the US and here. In Nigeria, they have been living above the law. They are now clearly a danger to the planet. The dangers of this happening again and again are high. They must be taken to the international court of justice."

Life expectancy of just over the 40's. I knew about blood diamonds, but now there appears to be blood oil as well.

[Liberty]

This is what I hate about global capitalism. These huge multinational corporations can fuck over a third world country all they want, and they apparently don't care that they do it. And nobody cares! If someone tries this shit in a first world country, the entire world freaks out. Why the hell is there this disparity?! I can't even find words for this.

[darthdavid]

Why the hell is there this disparity?! I can't even find words for this.

Because it's easy to pay off the corrupt government of an impoverished nation and between a desire for cheap oil and the fact that the officials there get lots of bribes campaign donations (just like their third world counterparts) no one with the power to put a stop to this sort of thing actually has any inclination to do so. As fox news would say ( ) 'follow the money'.

[Samuel]

Don't forget that Nigeria is essentially a Petrostate.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publication ... os/ni.html

Nigeria's former military rulers failed to diversify the economy away from its overdependence on the capital-intensive oil sector, which provides 95% of foreign exchange earnings and about 80% of budgetary revenues.

So you don't even need to bribe government officials. Additionally you have people in the Niger Delta who are fighting the government for a share of the oil revenues so I don't see the government or oil companies giving a damn what local opinion is.

Shell, which works in partnership with the Nigerian government in the delta, says that 98% of all its oil spills are caused by vandalism, theft or sabotage by militants and only a minimal amount by deteriorating infrastructure. "We had 132 spills last year, as against 175 on average. Safety valves were vandalised; one pipe had 300 illegal taps. We found five explosive devices on one.

And the fact people are bombing the pipes or trying to steal oil doesn't help either.

[Aaron]

This is what I hate about global capitalism. These huge multinational corporations can fuck over a third world country all they want, and they apparently don't care that they do it. And nobody cares! If someone tries this shit in a first world country, the entire world freaks out. Why the hell is there this disparity?! I can't even find words for this.

Because no one gives a shit about Africa, in a sense colonialism never really ended. It just got a face lift.

[Temujin]

This is what I hate about global capitalism. These huge multinational corporations can fuck over a third world country all they want, and they apparently don't care that they do it. And nobody cares! If someone tries this shit in a first world country, the entire world freaks out. Why the hell is there this disparity?! I can't even find words for this.

Because no one gives a shit about Africa, in a sense colonialism never really ended. It just got a face lift.

Exactly! It's the same thing with the kind of sweatshop wage slave labor that existed in the western nations up to the early 20th century. That work got shifted first to immigrants in country, than to a lot of the homelands of those immigrants. Watch Blood Sweat and Takeaways/T-shirts and you'll see that slavery, serfdom, etc. is alive and well thanks to capitalism and consumer culture. And the sad fact is there really is no way to easily or quickly end this shit without harming the very people you would want to save.

Africa is extremely rich in resources. The only reason there hasn't been more exploitation is the rugged geology and climate, and the difficulty and expense in establishing and sustaining the necessary infrastructure.

[Sky Captain]

What I don't get is: oil costs money, leaked oil = less profit for company. It seems it would be logical that companies would try to fix any leaking pipes as fast as possible to prevent valuable oil being wasted even if they don't care about pollution.

[Shroom Man 777]

No one is angry with the Nigerian oil spill because big government is letting the free market handle it, instead of reacting and trying to stop the spill regulating it. People reacted to America's spill because big government was trying to interfere instead of letting the free market run its course.

[bobalot]

What I don't get is: oil costs money, leaked oil = less profit for company. It seems it would be logical that companies would try to fix any leaking pipes as fast as possible to prevent valuable oil being wasted even if they don't care about pollution.

Dude, are you serious? It's called cutting corners and short-termist cost cutting. Greedy assholes want greater profits now rather than greater profits over the medium to long term.

[fgalkin]

What I don't get is: oil costs money, leaked oil = less profit for company. It seems it would be logical that companies would try to fix any leaking pipes as fast as possible to prevent valuable oil being wasted even if they don't care about pollution.

Dude, are you serious? It's called cutting corners and short-termist cost cutting. Greedy assholes want greater profits now rather than greater profits over the medium to long term.

I fail to see how a non-functional pipeline, or one that is leaking severely is "cost-cutting." Assuming the 9 million barrels of oil spilled, and using today's prices, we're talking more than $600 million worth of oil being wasted. You could probably replace every pipeline in Nigeria for that kind of money.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Simon_Jester]

I suspect the fundamental problem is that even if they repair the pipes, the damn things just wind up leaking again: more illegal tapping and more sabotage. They'd have to fix the pipes faster than the locals could break them.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Who wants to bet that, this being Africa, the locals don't know the difference between raw crude and refined gasoline, and are robbing the pipes with the intention of running their cars (or others they'll sell to) on it?

[Samuel]

Who wants to bet that, this being Africa, the locals don't know the difference between raw crude and refined gasoline, and are robbing the pipes with the intention of running their cars (or others they'll sell to) on it?

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/tra_m ... r-vehicles

Nigeria- 1 car per 100 people. I don't think that is a major source of theft given the people who have cars are rich enough to have better things to do with their time.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Who wants to bet that, this being Africa, the locals don't know the difference between raw crude and refined gasoline, and are robbing the pipes with the intention of running their cars (or others they'll sell to) on it?

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/tra_m ... r-vehicles

Nigeria- 1 car per 100 people. I don't think that is a major source of theft given the people who have cars are rich enough to have better things to do with their time.

Lagos' waste management sites have their own shantytowns in them, full of people who comb over garbage for a few cents a perfume bottle or coffee tin. I agree that they probably don't have their own cars, but if 1 in 100 Nigerians has does, that'd be enough to support a... rather confused market of enterprising bandits who are going to be disappointed each and every time, only after they compromise a pipe.

[Mayabird]

Actually, they they sell the oil to refineries, often in other countries but sometimes in Nigeria itself. The country is so corrupt that the oil thieves can get away with it. This is not a small-scale thing. It even has its own name: bunkering. They're not trying to get gas for their own use. I'm guessing that regular people have to collect oil from leaks and sell to the same gangs/government officials/both whatever they get, and since Nigeria is massively overpopulated and has pretty much no economy besides oil (they used to be an exporter of foodstuffs, then oil was discovered and now they have to import food) regular people have little choice in the matter.

[TithonusSyndrome]

I knew that backyard refineries weren't likely, but for some reason this didn't occur to me either. I guess I was anticipating some level of... regulation? Policing? Who knows.

There's just no understating how ridiculously exploitative and corrupt a completely free market can get, I guess.

[Samuel]

I wouldn't blame it on the free market as much as the fact you have people who are dirt poor and find that they can improve their lives tremendously by stealing oil. Think of it like the illegal drug trade except without any easy solution.

[xt828]

The people stealing oil are the problem? The illegal drug trade has an easy solution? Please, explain.

[bobalot]

What I don't get is: oil costs money, leaked oil = less profit for company. It seems it would be logical that companies would try to fix any leaking pipes as fast as possible to prevent valuable oil being wasted even if they don't care about pollution.

Dude, are you serious? It's called cutting corners and short-termist cost cutting. Greedy assholes want greater profits now rather than greater profits over the medium to long term.

I fail to see how a non-functional pipeline, or one that is leaking severely is "cost-cutting." Assuming the 9 million barrels of oil spilled, and using today's prices, we're talking more than $600 million worth of oil being wasted. You could probably replace every pipeline in Nigeria for that kind of money.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

It's simple. They just skimp on preventive maintenance until at some point it breaks down.

[Samuel]

The people stealing oil are the problem? The illegal drug trade has an easy solution? Please, explain.

Well, the fact rebels are attacking the pipe line and people are punching holes in it causing the companies to lose millions sort of suggests that is a problem.

As for the solution to the illegal drug trade that would be legalization. It doesn't solve the problems of drugs and their health affects, but it does solve the drug trade problem.

[xt828]

I would have thought that the presence of the rebels and the fact that these people need to punch holes in the pipelines to survive would be signals that there are some deeper problems. You aren't seriously saying that you think that the oil companies involved here are the victims, are you?

[Chaotic Neutral]

The illegal drug trade has an easy solution? Please, explain.

Hint: The same solution as Prohibition.

[General Zod]

The people stealing oil are the problem? The illegal drug trade has an easy solution? Please, explain.

Well, the fact rebels are attacking the pipe line and people are punching holes in it causing the companies to lose millions sort of suggests that is a problem.

As for the solution to the illegal drug trade that would be legalization. It doesn't solve the problems of drugs and their health affects, but it does solve the drug trade problem.

Considering the sheer amount of corruption in Nigeria I don't think legalization is going to solve anything.

[Samuel]

I was saying this didn't have the same easy solution as the drug trade Zod although the motivation (poor people with a chance to make shitloads of money easily) is similar.

I would have thought that the presence of the rebels and the fact that these people need to punch holes in the pipelines to survive would be signals that there are some deeper problems

You mean poverty? Which was what one of the features I was talking about?

You aren't seriously saying that you think that the oil companies involved here are the victims, are you?

There are- people are blowing up their pipes, kidnapping their workers and generally fucking with them.

[General Zod]

I was saying this didn't have the same easy solution as the drug trade Zod although the motivation (poor people with a chance to make shitloads of money easily) is similar.

And given the sheer amount of corruption in the government all you're doing is applying a bandaid to a stomach full of buckshot. You have to address that problem before you can even hope to fix anything else.