Brent Spar - Impact of Brent Spar

Impact of Brent Spar

According to a poll of 1000 adults carried out by Opinion Leader Research on behalf of Greenpeace, as of 26 January 1996, a majority of the British public were aware of the Brent Spar (57%). Of these, 57% were opposed to the dumping of Brent Spar in the Atlantic, and 32% were in favour of it.

Although Shell had carried out an environmental impact assessment in full accordance with existing legislation, and firmly believed that their actions were in the best interests of the environment, they had severely underestimated strength of public opinion. Shell were particularly criticised for having thought of this as a "Scottish", or "UK" problem, and neglecting to think of the impact which it would have on their image in the wider world. The final cost of the Brent Spar operation to Shell was between £60M and £100M, when loss of sales were considered. Although Shell and the offshore industry consider that Brent Spar did not set a precedent for disposal of facilities in the future, signatory nations of the OSPAR conventions have since agreed that oil facilities should be disposed of onshore, so it is difficult to see how this does not set a precedent. Shell claimed that spending such an amount to protect a small area of remote, low resource value, deep sea was pointless and this money could be much more constructively spent.

The overestimation of the contents of the Brent Spar damaged the credibility of Greenpeace in their wider campaigns. They were criticised in an editorial column in the scientific journal Nature for their lack of interest in facts. Greenpeace moved to distance itself from its "5500 tonnes" claim, after the Brent Spar argument was won, and because of this has been accused of indulging in historical revisionism, after issuing statements such as "In the absence of a full inventory, Greenpeace, during our occupation, attempted to find out what was on the Brent Spar. The estimates resulting from this sampling were in no way central to the campaign...". This allegation has also been levelled at individuals, such as Lord Melchett, executive director of Greenpeace UK, who wrote in New Scientist magazine, "Greenpeace made mistakes too. We allowed ourselves to follow the agenda set by the Department of Trade and Industry, Shell and the media – too often getting into arguments about the potential toxicity of the Spar.".