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By John Donovan
The Times published an important article by Tim Webb today under the headline: “Shell counts cost of oil damage in Niger Delta.” (Page 39, Thursday 31 Jan 2013). Tim correctly makes the simple, but immensely important point: “IT IS THE FIRST TIME THAT A COURT OUTSIDE NIGERIA HAS ORDERED SHELL TO PAY FOR POLLUTION IN THE DELTA AND THE RULING LEAVES IT VULNERABLE TO MORE CLAIMS.” Shell has predictably tried to downplay this historic, precedent setting verdict.
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Royal Dutch Shell RDSB.LN -2.88% isn’t an obvious candidate for sympathy. The oil and (increasingly) gas major raked in $26.6 billion last year, with Brent crude-oil prices averaging above $100 per barrel.
Yet Shell’s full-year earnings were 14% down on 2011 and missed consensus forecasts, while its oil output rose by just 1%.
The results capture Shell’s investment proposition perfectly: Its sheer scale and operational expertise mean shareholders can sleep easy, but they’re unlikely to dream big.
January 31, 2013
LONDON—U.K.-listed oil and gas company Royal Dutch Shell RDSB.LN -2.73% PLC Thursday said it would increase capital expenditure this year, despite the uncertain global economic outlook, with the aim of finding and developing more resources and rejoining the ranks of the world’s top oil and gas producers by 2018.
The spending plans came as Shell missed expectations by posting a 13% rise in profit for the fourth quarter, with analysts expressing concern about the amount of money the company spent on exploration.
By Brian Swint – Jan 31, 2013 8:04 AM GMT
Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA), Europe’s biggest energy company, said investment will increase after fourth-quarter profit missed analyst estimates on weaker North American fuel prices.
Excluding one-time items and inventory changes, profit was $5.6 billion. That was below the $6.2 billion average estimate of 11 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Net capital spending of about $33 billion this year compares with $30 billion in 2012.
Higher costs of getting oil and gas to production are offsetting gains from rising output and record Brent crude prices. Chief Executive Officer Peter Voser is trying to appease investors by raising the dividend in the first quarter, and he expects to increase output to about 4 million barrels of oil equivalent a day in 2017 from 3.3 million barrels last year.
31 January 2013 Last updated at 07:41
Annual profits at Royal Dutch Shell have fallen to $27bn (£17bn), from $28.6bn in 2011.
Profits for the last three months of the year rose to $7.3bn, against $6.5bn, but Shell was hit by generally weaker oil and gas prices during 2012.
Peter Voser, chief executive of Europe’s biggest oil company, said 2012 was a year of “headwinds”.
But he added that Shell was “delivering a strategy that others can’t easily repeat”.
(Reuters) – A Dutch court ruled on Wednesday that Royal Dutch Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary was responsible for a case of oil pollution in the Niger Delta and ordered it to pay damages in a decision that could open the door to further litigation.
The district court in The Hague said Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd. (SPDC), a wholly-owned subsidiary, must compensate one farmer, but dismissed four other claims filed against the Dutch parent company.
Four Nigerians and campaign group Friends of the Earth filed suits in 2008 in The Hague, where Shell has its global headquarters, seeking reparations for lost income from contaminated land and waterways in the Niger Delta region, the heart of the Nigerian oil industry.
A court in the Netherlands has ruled that Royal Dutch Shell can be held partially responsible for pollution in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region and ordered it to pay damages to one farmer.
The court dismissed on Wednesday four out of five allegations against the oil company. The amount of damages to be paid was to be announced at a later date.
Activists say the case could set a precedent for damage claims related to the foreign activities of multinational companies.
Four Nigerians and interest group Friends of the Earth filed the suit in 2008 in The Hague, where Shell has its joint global headquarters, seeking unspecified reparations for lost income from contaminated land and waterways in the Niger Delta.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A Dutch court has ruled that a subsidiary of international oil giant Royal Dutch Shell should be held responsible for pipeline leaks poisoning farmland in Nigeria.
In its ruling Wednesday, the Hague Civil Court rejected most of a landmark case brought by Nigerian farmers and environmental pressure group Friends of the Earth against Shell, saying the leaking pipelines were was caused by saboteurs, not Shell negligence.
However, in one case the judges ordered a subsidiary, Shell Nigeria, to compensate a farmer for breach of duty of care by making it too easy for saboteurs to open an oil well head that leaked on to his land.
30 January 2013 Last updated at 13:02
A Dutch court has rejected four out of five allegations against Anglo-Dutch oil giant Shell over oil pollution in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region.
But it found a subsidiary of the firm, Shell Nigeria, responsible for one case of pollution, ordering it to pay compensation to a Nigerian farmer.
Shell said it was “happy” with the verdict in the landmark case.
The case was brought by four Nigerian farmers and Friends of the Earth, which says it is “flabbergasted”.
By Nils Klawitter
Four Nigerian villagers from the Niger River delta have challenged mighty Shell in a Dutch court. They complain that the oil giant has caused environmental devastation and ruined their homes. A verdict in the unprecedented case is expected on Wednesday.
Royal Dutch Shell CEO Peter Voser likes to talk about the good deeds his company performs worldwide. “Sustainable development and social performance is absolutely key in the way we do our business,” says Voser, a Swiss national. The head of Shell feels a duty to pursue such noble objectives as observing human rights and protecting the environment.
Published January 30, 2013 by Associated Press
THE HAGUE, Netherlands – Dutch judges are ruling in a landmark civil action by Nigerian farmers who want to hold oil giant Shell liable for poisoning their fish ponds and farmlands with leaking pipelines.
The decision being announced Wednesday could set a legal precedent for holding multinationals responsible for their actions overseas.
Lawyers for the four Nigerians from the oil-rich Niger delta argue Shell makes key policy decisions at its Hague headquarters, so the Dutch court has jurisdiction.
Teck and Shell bicker over oil sands projects: National Post-CALGARY — A land dispute with Shell Canada Ltd. is threatening Teck Resources Ltd.’s first standalone oil sands project, adding uncertainty …
President Obama Should Prioritize Protecting the Arctic as Part of …: Huffington Post (blog)-Shell Oil Company’s Arctic drilling program once again came under national scrutiny when its drill rig, the Kulluk, ran aground off of Alaska’s …
HSBC: Oil majors at risk from ‘unburnable’ reserves: Business Green-Oil and gas majors, including, BP, Shell, and Statoil, could face a loss in market value of up to 60 per cent should the international community …
There’s not much left of Goi, an Ogoni village on the Niger delta.
When I went there two years ago large parts of it and the surrounding land still hadn’t recovered from a series of spills of Shell oil that had taken place in 2004. Most Goi people had been farmers and fishermen, but they had mostly moved out because the water, the houses, the mud in the creeks all still reeked of crude.
I had met Eric Dooh whose family comes from Goi, and who has spent years fighting Shell for compensation. This week he’s in Amsterdam representing his father and on Wednesday, he and three other farmers from other parts of the polluted Niger delta will hear the verdict of a Dutch court on the case.
By MarketWatch Jan. 28, 2013
The board of Spain’s Repsol SA will analyze and likely approve at its meeting Wednesday the sale of the oil company’s liquefied natural gas assets to Royal Dutch Shell, reports Cinco Dias in its Tuesday Internet edition, citing people close to the operation.
The company was initially looking to raise some 3 billion euros ($4 billion), but the final figure could be much lower, in the ballpark of EUR2 billion, the paper adds, citing the same sources.
Repsol’s LNG assets are located in Peru, Trinidad and Tobago, Canada and Spain.
Mon Jan 28, 2013 9:10am EST
(Reuters) – Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSa.L) said it will tie up with Kinder Morgan Inc (KMI.N) to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) from a terminal near Savannah, Georgia.
El Paso Pipeline Partners LP (EPB.N), a Kinder Morgan unit, and Shell will form a limited liability company to develop a natural gas liquefaction plant at Southern LNG Co LLC’s existing terminal.
Recent drilling innovations have unlocked vast shale oil and gas reserves, placing the United States in a position to be a major exporter. A number of companies
, including Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N), have lined up to get permission to sell the country’s cheap abundant natural gas overseas, where it can fetch much higher prices.
Shell was given advance sight of this article and the opportunity to point out any factual inaccuracy.
By John Donovan
In March 2002, Simon Henry, the current Chief Financial Officer of Royal Dutch Shell Plc was head of Investor Relations for the Royal Dutch Shell Group.
Mr Henry was responsible for gathering reserves data and ensuring the quality/accuracy of the data before it was disclosed to analysts and investors. It turned out that some of the data was not only inaccurate, but also fraudulent.
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