About the BTC Pipeline

BP is building a new oil pipeline. Not just any pipeline, but one that passes through one of the world’s most volatile, not to mention environmentally valuable, regions.

The impacts will certainly be very ‘real’ , but how ‘positive’ ? It seems to WWF that there is a wide gulf between BP’s Corporate Social Responsibility rhetoric and the reality of the Baku - Tbilisi -Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline. For example:

BP’s ‘green’ image would lead us to expect that environmental assessments are always carried out before applications are made for government approval. WWF believes that this has not been the case. In the BTC application procedure, BP has – in WWF’s view –continuously presented the project as a fait accompli, and failed to adequately consider alternative pipeline routes.

• BP would have us believe that it adheres to best international practice. But WWF has submitted complaints that the BTC pipeline project fails to meet the standards of the International Finance Corporation, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the OECD and the EU.
• BP promised its lenders it would not go through protected areas. Yet, contrary to Georgian law, the pipeline goes right through a nationally protected wetland area, which is a vital habitat for protected and endangered migratory birds.

WWF does not oppose economic development, or pipelines, per se. In our opinion the BTC pipeline poses unacceptable risks to people and nature in the Caucasus .

We believe that it threatens internationally significant biodiversity as well as natural resources that are the basis of economic prosperity in the region.

We also believe that BP’s ‘measurements’ of the impacts are inadequate, and that their environmental assessments to date are fundamentally flawed.

The EBRD and the IFC (the private sector arm of the World Bank) have agreed to contribute funds, including tax-payers’ money, to a project developed by a process that has been both undemocratic and inadequate. WWF calls for:

• Commercial banks, in particular the four announced lead arrangers, to withhold support from the BTC project until a transparent and consultative review of processes to date has taken place.
• International funding institutions to demand from BP and other oil companies earlier engagement in fully transparent planning processes, as well as compliance with strategic environmental assessments and adherence to best international practice for all future pipeline projects.
• BP and others to ensure that investment agreements between companies and host governments are not used to undermine local standards and legislation on the environment.

[Text taken from the WWF advertisement pdf (0.09 MB)]