Shell marketing consultant quits, accusing firm of ‘excessive harms’ to setting | Shell

A senior security advisor has quit working with Shell after 11 years, accusing the fossil fuel producer in a bombshell public video of causing “excessive harms” to the surroundings.

Caroline Dennett claimed Shell had a “disregard for climate change risks” and urged others in the oil and fuel industry to “walk away whereas there’s nonetheless time”.

The chief, who works for the independent agency Clout, ended her working relationship with Shell in an open letter to its executives and 1,400 staff. In an accompanying video, posted on LinkedIn, she said she had quit due to Shell’s “double-talk on climate”.

Dennett accused the oil and fuel firm of “operating past the design limits of our planetary programs” and “not putting environmental safety earlier than manufacturing”.

She said: “Shell’s said security ambition is to ‘do no hurt’ – ‘Goal Zero’, they call it – and it sounds honourable but they're fully failing on it.

“They know that continued oil and gas extraction causes extreme harms, to our climate, to the environment and to people. And no matter they say, Shell is simply not winding down on fossil fuels.”

Dennett told the Guardian she “could not marry these conflicts with my conscience”, including: “I could not carry that any longer, and I’m ready to deal with the implications.”

Shell was a “main shopper” of Dennett’s business, which specialises in evaluating safety procedures in high-risk industries together with oil and fuel manufacturing. She began working with Shell within the aftermath of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, which rocked the trade.

“I can no longer work for a corporation that ignores all the alarms and dismisses the dangers of climate change and ecological collapse,” she said. “As a result of, contrary to Shell’s public expressions around net zero, they aren't winding down on oil and gasoline, but planning to discover and extract far more.”

Dennett – a felony justice graduate who has spent her profession in research and consultancy – was impressed to cease working with Shell after watching news footage of Extinction Rebellion climate protesters urging the company’s workers to depart. The movement’s TruthTeller whistleblowing challenge encourages oil and gas employees to stroll away from the business.

The guide, who runs inner safety surveys and relies in Weymouth, Dorset, acknowledged she was “privileged” to have the ability to walk away and “many people working in fossil gas companies just aren’t so fortunate”.

She urged Shell’s executives to “look in the mirror and ask themselves in the event that they really imagine their imaginative and prescient for extra oil and fuel extraction secures a secure future for humanity”.

In late 2020, several Shell executives in its clear power sector left amid stories they had been frustrated at the pace of Shell’s shift in the direction of greener fuels.

Her announcement comes on the eve of Shell’s AGM in London on Tuesday. Its plans to reduce emissions will probably be mentioned on the meeting the place the Dutch activist group Observe This can push for the company’s insurance policies to be more in line with the Paris local weather accord. Shell’s board has instructed buyers to reject the group’s resolution that asks it to set more stringent climate targets.

The Shell investor Royal London has said it intends to abstain on a vote on the firm’s climate transition proposals.

The Shell chief government, Ben van Beurden, might experience an investor insurrection against his £13.5m pay packet at the AGM after the funding adviser Pirc urged a vote in opposition to it.

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A Shell spokesperson mentioned: “Be in little doubt, we're decided to deliver on our world strategy to be a net zero firm by 2050 and 1000's of our people are working onerous to achieve this. We've got set targets for the short, medium and long run, and have each intention of hitting them.

“We’re already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon vitality, although the world will still want oil and gas for decades to come back in sectors that can’t be simply decarbonised.”

Shell also faces the prospect of a potential windfall tax to fund cuts to family bills after the power business reported bumper earnings fuelled by the rise in market costs, prompting opposition parties to name on the government to bring in a one-off levy.

On Monday, the largest oil and fuel producer in the North Sea spoke out in opposition to a one-off levy, arguing it could lead to the business approving fewer projects.

Harbour Energy’s chief government, Linda Prepare dinner, advised the Financial Occasions: “The next tax burden will make it more difficult for brand new oil and fuel tasks to meet investment hurdle charges, that means fewer projects shall be sanctioned.

“This is at a time when industry is being inspired to extend domestic UK oil and gasoline manufacturing and support an orderly power transition.”

Harbour has advised the federal government it plans to invest $6bn in the North Sea over three years as industry makes its case against the tax. The Guardian revealed this month that Prepare dinner had received a £4.6m “golden good day” from the agency.