May 18, 2005
Chevron Responds to Amazon Watch Letter
Ms. Atossa Soltani
Executive Director
Amazon Watch
Dear Ms. Soltani:
I am writing in response to your April 26, 2005 letter to Chevron Chairman and CEO David O'Reilly. It is important that the company call attention to the misrepresentations of the facts in the ongoing environmental litigation against Chevron in Ecuador, and to address the specific allegations made in your letter.
The assertions made in your letter are without foundation and are clear distortions of the facts in this case. Specifically,
- All of the statements made by Chevron on this matter over the 12-year period since the lawsuit was first filed have been truthful and accurate, based on the facts known at the time.
- With regard to the company's statements concerning the ongoing judicial inspections and the technical reports that have been presented to the court, each one is entirely consistent with what has been presented at the trial and submitted to the court.
- Contrary to your assertion, the reports submitted by Chevron's technical experts contain voluminous technical data that demonstrate without question that the remediation program carried out by Texaco Petroleum was effective and in accordance with Ecuadorian and world standards for the time.
- Moreover, these data also show conclusively that surrounding water supplies do not contain harmful levels of petroleum-related contaminants; yet they do show significantly elevated levels of bacteria contamination - typically caused by human or animal fecal waste and unrelated to oil production. These data are consistent with the growing scientific consensus that health concerns reported in the area are more likely due to this bacterial contamination in the water supplies.
- The plaintiffs, meanwhile, have still not presented any credible scientific evidence to support their claims or contradict these findings. The technical reports they have submitted have been inconsistent, contradictory, error-filled and have generally not been in conformance with the Court orders which mandate how the inspection sampling, analysis and reports must be carried out. For example, in many instances the plaintiffs' reports make claims about contaminated water supplies, yet they did not take any water samples to support such claims.
In short, while your letter accuses ChevronTexaco of making "false and misleading" statements, any reasonable review of the court records and all publicly available statements on this matter will show conclusively that Chevron has been truthful and honest.
As your letter addresses specifically the inspection of the SA-53 well site, we would like to provide the following clarifications and context.
With respect to the plaintiffs' report on this site, the assertions, claims and conclusions presented in the report are wrong. The report presents findings without scientific evidentiary support, misapplies standards and misuses technical and scientific information. The report is littered with contradictions. Although the report claims the contrary, the evidence and laboratory data presented in the report demonstrates that no additional remediation is necessary and that the concentrations of petroleum-related contaminants that exist are below the appropriate criteria for public health.
In their SA-53 report, the plaintiffs allege that strong concentrations of heavy metals exist in the soil, yet what they're pointing to is no different from naturally occurring levels of metals that are found in anyone's back yard. They claim that their samples show that Texpet didn't remediate its sites, when in actual fact they did not analyze samples taken from those sites. They claim that the Sacha-53 site has harmful chemicals such as benzene that can cause health impacts, when their own laboratory data clearly demonstrates that these chemicals are not present.
There are numerous problems with the plaintiffs' claims about the TPH levels in the data presented to the Court by Chevron's technical experts on this site:
- These areas at SA-53 were never part of Texpet's responsibility under the Remediation Action Plan and are the sole responsibility of Petroecuador to remediate.
- The plaintiffs want to retroactively apply 2001 and 2003 regulatory criteria to judge site conditions even though the Government of Ecuador never asked Texpet to meet these criteria in 1996-1998. In fact Texpet met all the criteria requested by the Government during the remediation.
- The plaintiffs say that Texpet took advantage of "loose" Ecuador regulations. However, a review of pit remediation regulations Venezuela, Colombia and the United States in the 1990's (and still today) are 10,000 ppm TPH, which is less restrictive than 5,000 ppm TPH action level established by the Government of Ecuador for the Texpet remediation work.
- The plaintiffs assert that U.S. regulations are 20 times more stringent than Ecuadorian regulations, which is totally false and misleading. In fact, in the U.S., those states which govern exploration and production activities and pit remediation use 10,000 ppm TPH as a numerical standard, if they have any. No state requires the analysis of PAHs and metals for pit remediation and closure as claimed by the plaintiffs. The regulations the plaintiffs are quoting are for underground storage tanks for gasoline - which is a much different situation than the matter in Ecuador.
- The residual TPH that remains in the subsoil is highly weathered and biodegraded rendering it immobile and non-toxic. There is absolutely no reason to believe that this residual TPH results in any risk to human heath either due to direct contact, leaching to groundwater, or exposure to volatiles in the air. In fact, the USEPA does not consider TPH to be carcinogenic as claimed on your website, and the USEPA has never set a drinking water standard for TPH.
In regard to your assertions regarding the legality of the remediation agreement between Texaco Petroleum, Petroecuador and the Republic of Ecuador, you should be aware of the following:
- The Remediation Agreement signed between Texaco Petroleum Company, the Republic of Ecuador and Petroecuador was the result of thorough and comprehensive discussions with several government officials, government agencies, representatives and experts through various years and several administrations in Ecuador. The remediation work was inspected and certified on a site by site basis by several inspectors representing at least four government agencies in the country.
- The Ecuadorian government's publicly held position, which has been reiterated many times both orally and in writing over the past decade, is that the agreement is valid.
- Most recently, at an April 11, 2005 hearing at U.S. Federal Court in New York on the matter of ChevronTexaco's arbitration claim against Petroecuador, the attorney retained by Attorney General Borja to represent the Republic of Ecuador and Petroecuador acknowledged that the 1995 remediation agreement was legitimate and binding on the government.
- Also, in February 2004, the Minister of Energy and Mines, Carlos Arboleda, stated, 'Here the State has a very clear position that has been ratified whenever we have been asked on the subject. The State is aware that a total and final release, which was absolutely binding was signed between Texaco and the State.'
- In addition, a January 3, 1996 amicus brief filed by the Government of Ecuador in New York, the Ecuadorian Ambassador to the U.S. stated under oath, 'The recent agreement between the Republic, Petroecuador and Texaco Petroleum Company, which was reviewed and supported by the Ecuadorian Congress, as well as the Republic's amicus curiae brief filed in this action with the express permission and support of the President of Ecuador, demonstrates the Republic's determination to fulfill this obligation.'
- Furthermore, on November 11, 1998, another Ecuadorian Ambassador to the US stated in writing to Honorable Judge Jed S. Rakoff that, 'The Republic of Ecuador, by virtue of the "Acta Final" of September 30, 1998, in accordance with the "Contrato para la Ejecución de Trabajos de Reparacion Medioambiental" (Contract for implementation of Environment Repair Works) of May 4, 1995, absolved, liberated and forever freed TEXPET, Texas Petroleum Company, Compañia TEXACO de Petróleos del Ecuador, S.A., TEXACO Inc., its employees, principals and subsidiaries of any claim or litigation by the Government of the Republic of Ecuador concerning the obligations acquired by TEXPET in the fore-mentioned contract.'
Finally, with respect to your suggestion of a theoretical conflict of interest on the part of one of the company's in-house attorneys working on this matter, we believe such assertions are without foundation and logic.
In closing, we find it disappointing that Amazon Watch would participate in such an outrageous effort to influence public opinion by advancing the sort of distortions contained in your letter.
Sincerely,
Edward B. Scott
Vice President and General Counsel
Chevron International Exploration and Production Company
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