CSR Press Release

In a 2006 Rolling Stone interview, Al Gore infamously likened the practice of extracting oil from tar sands to "junkies find[ing] veins in their toes" to inject heroin. Gore's image simply extends George Bush's 2006 State of the Union "addicted to oil" metaphor to its logical conclusion. Clean, renewable energy represents a healthy cure for petro-addiction. Tar sands, which increase the carbon intensity of petroleum extraction, represent an exacerbation of the climate-changing addiction - kind of like trying to cure heroin addiction by injecting arsenic.

When BP - the company that re-branded itself "Beyond Petroleum" in 2000 - announced in December 2007 a new partnership with Husky Energy of Canada to extract oil from the Sunrise tar sands fields in Alberta, its press release did not mention the carbon implications. Greenpeace, which immediately criticized BP's move, pointed out that "it takes about 29kg of CO2 to produce a barrel of oil conventionally." Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner Mike Hudema added, "that figure can be as much as 125kg for tar sands oil. It also has the potential to kill off or damage the vast forest wilderness, greater than the size of England and Wales, which forms part of the world's biggest carbon sinks."

At the BP annual stockholder meeting last Wednesday, a coalition of socially responsible investing firms such as Boston Common Asset Management and Christian Brothers Investment Services issued a joint statement questioning the apparent contradiction between BP's "Beyond Petroleum" tagline and its move toward even more destructive forms of petroleum.

"We had understood from BP that the company would not participate in the tar sands due to their high carbon footprint, and therefore this came as a big surprise and disappointment," said Shelley Alpern of coalition member Trillium Asset Management. "This should simply be a no-go area for BP. We expect better from the company that aspires to go beyond petroleum."

Trillium and Green Century Capital Management have filed shareholder resolutions asking Chevron and ConocoPhillips to report on the environmental and social impacts of their tar sands development.

BP will likely face a similar shareholder resolution next year unless BP satisfactorily answers the concerns voiced by the shareholder coalition.

This article was written by CSRwire contributor Bill Baue.

To read the latest corporate social responsibility news from Baxter, AT&T, Dole, IBM and other leading socially responsible organizations, visit http://www.csrwire.com/LastAlert.html.

About CSRwire's Weekly News Alert

CSRwire's free weekly News Alert is a summary of the latest and most important CSR news from the week, put into context with local and global news. The Alert highlights noteworthy initiatives and informs the CSR and Social Responsible Investing communities including professionals, analysts, academics activists, and consumers.

Click Here to subscribe to the CSRwire Weekly News Alert.

About CSRwire.com

CSRwire is the leading source of corporate social responsibility and sustainability news, reports and information. CSRwire members are companies and NGOs, agencies and organizations interested in communicating their corporate citizenship, sustainability, and socially responsible initiatives to a global audience through CSRwire's syndication network and weekly News Alerts. CSRwire content covers issues of Diversity, Philanthropy, Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) Environment, Human Rights, Workplace Issues, Business Ethics, Community Development and Corporate Governance.


For more information, please contact: