here are some of the facts we shared last week:

• In a rainforest area roughly three times the size of Manhattan, Chevron carved out 350 oil wells, and upon leaving the country in 1992, left behind some 1,000 open-air, unlined waste pits filled with crude and toxic sludge. Many of these pits leak into the water table or overflow in heavy rains, polluting rivers and streams that tens of thousands of people depend on for drinking, cooking, bathing and fishing.
• Chevron also dumped more than 18 billion gallons of toxic wastewater called “produced water” – a byproduct of the drilling process – into the rivers of the Oriente. At the height of Texaco’s operations, the company was dumping an estimated 4 million gallons of per day, a practice outlawed in major US oil producing states like Louisiana, Texas, and California decades before the company began operations in Ecuador in 1967. By handling its toxic waste in Ecuador in ways that were illegal in its home country, Texaco saved an estimated $3 per barrel of oil produced.
• Some Incursion into indigenous lands and communities:

Alaska- Gwichin >> BP, Exxon, Chevron, Philipps
Bolivia- Chiquitano, Ayoreo, Guarani, Weekayek  >> British Gas, Enron, World Bank, Shell, US Overseas Private Investement Corporation
Brazil- Apurina, Paurami, Deni, Juma >> Haliburton, El Paso Energy
Colombia- Uwa>> Shell, BP
Ecuador- Sarayaku Kichwa, Shuar, Achuar, Huaorani>> Chevron
Nigeria >> Shell

• “People who think that peak oil will occur are just looking at conventional oil.  You have to think beyond that.  Think of all the other hydrocarbon resources, the oil sands in Cananda…  Think of all the remote areas of the world that have not yet been explored….”         -David O’Reilly, Chevron CEO, 2006
• Fewer and fewer major new oil fields are discovered each year:

16 in 2000
9 in 2001
1 in 2005 

• The Chevron Refinery is the largest industrial polluter in the region! EPA reported nearly 100,000 pounds of toxic waste from the site in 2007, including at least 38 different toxic substances, including more than 4,000 pounds of benzene (a known human carcinogen) and 455,000 pounds of ammonia, repeated exposure to which can cause an asthma-like allergy and lead to lung damage. The refinery is now and has been listed as in “high priority violation” of air compliance standards, among other violations, by the EPA every year since 2006.
• Asthma rates in Richmond are twice as high as the national average. Children living in Richmond are already hospitalized for asthma at almost twice the rate of children in the rest of the county due to the impacts of toxic refinery flares emissions from Chevron. The local community, composed primarily of low-income people of color, suffers from disproportionately high rates of asthma, cancers, and health problems related to the refinery.
• The Iraq oil law, also referred to as the Iraq hydrocarbon law, is a proposed piece of legislation submitted to the Iraqi Council of Representatives in May 2007.  The Bush administration hired the consulting firm BearingPoint to help write the law in 2004.  The Iraqi government has yet to reach an agreement on the law.  In the current draft foreign companies would not have to invest their earnings in the Iraqi economy, partner with Iraqi companies or hire Iraqi workers.  None of the oil produced from Iraq’s oil fields would need to stay in Iraq, it could all be exported.  The law would grant the companies contracts of up to 35 years.
• Nigeria, the world’s 8th largest exporter of oil earned more than $400 billion from oil in recent decades, yet 9/10 citizen live on less than $2/day.  80% of Nigeria’s oil wealth has gone to 1 percent of the population.
• The United States produced enough oil to supply it’s own demand until 1970, In that year the U.S. had to start importing oil to meet the demand.
• Of the 65 largest oil-producing countries in the world, 54 have passed their peak production, just like in East Texas, and are now experiencing the decline. Five more countries will peak in their oil production six years from now: Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Kazakhstan and Bolivia.
• The largest oil terminal in the world, Ras Tanura, is located on the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia.   After extraction and processing, typically an oil terminal sends oil through pipelines to a terminal from the terminal then loads it onto a supertanker and ships to a port thousands of miles away, then run through a refinery and pours into a tanker truck that delivers to a gas station.
• During this process accidents occur along every segment of the transport system and at each point of transfer.  In the past 30 years, 30+ major oil spills have occured of 10 million gallons of oil or more each.
• Largest oil spills in history:

Persian Gulf, 1991, 240,000,000 gallons
Ixtoc Oil Well, Mexico, 1979-1980, 140,000,000
Persian Gulf, 1983, 80,000,000
South Africa- offshore, 1983, 78,500,000
BP “Deepwater Horizon” Gulf of Mexico, 2010 , 210,000,000+ (largest marine oil spill in the history)

• The United States imports more oil from Canada than from any other country.  3/4s of Canada’s oil exports go to the United States.  And while Canada’s domestic demand for oil has stabalized, its exports to the United States continue to climb.  Thus, while Canadians get the land, air and water pollution of tar sands production, the United States gets most of the oil.
• Top 10 U.S. Crude Oil Imports in 2009:  1) Canada 2) Mexico 3) Venezuela 4) Saudi Arabia 5) Nigeria 6) Angola 7) Iraq 8] Brazil 9) Colombia 10) Russia
• 90% of oil used in PI is imported.
• The US Department of Defense is the largest oil consuming government body in the US and in the world.  According to the US Defense Energy Support Center Fact Book 2004, in Fiscal Year 2004, the US military fuel consumption increased to 144 million barrels. This is about 40 million barrels more than the average peacetime military usage.  144 million barrels makes 395 000 barrels per day, almost as much as daily energy consumption of Greece.The US military is the biggest purchaser of oil in the world.
• Each American burns 25 barrels of oil a year, each Briton burns 11, each Chinese burns 2.  –which is more than 25% of the world’s total..  As a result, the U.S produces one fourth of the world’s carbon emissions.
• Compared to the Filipinos whose daily use of oil is 338,000 barrels or an annual of 123,370,000 barrels, the U.S.’ yearly oil accumulation can support 2,283 Filipinos. In short, one American uses what 16 Filipinos consume, equivalent to 27 barrels per American or 1.46 barrels per Filipino.
• Total oil consumed in barrels per day (bbl/day) in 2010..

1– United States
2–European Union
41–Philippines
67–New Zealand
132–Iceland
196–Samoa

• The IEA predicted the consumption in 2030 as 121 million barrels per day, which translates to a shortage of more then 90 million barrels per day in new production. This means, “the world needs 10 new Saudi Arabias.”
• The world has now consumed almost half the total amount of conventional oil.  Most experts estimate will ever be available for recovery. Assessments of the world’s ultimately recoverable oil reserves vary but 65 published studies by oil companies, geologists, government analysts and consultants over the past 50 years have produced remarkably consistent estimates. The overwhelming majority of these put the world’s original endowment of recoverable oil at no more than about 2,400 billion barrels; the average estimate is 2,000 billion barrels.
• Geologists estimate that only two trillion barrels of oil had accumulated in the Earth in 600 million years before humanity started using it. This translates to an accumulation rate of only 3,333 barrels per year, making oil essentially a non-renewable resource.
• Global demand for oil has increased seven-fold over the past half-century due to rapid population growth and industrial expansion.