Chevron in Ecuador

The archive of the Clean Up Ecuador campaign website


News and Multimedia from 2003

Fighting Goliath

Ecuadoreans Seek Billions from ChevronTexaco in a Widely Watched Environmental Justice Case
12 December 2003 | San Francisco Bay Guardian

In an environmental justice lawsuit with major international implications, ChevronTexaco is battling plaintiffs representing 30,000 residents of northeastern Ecuador who claim they were harmed by the toxic mess the San Ramon-based oil giant left in their communities.     Read more...

ChevronTexaco on Trial in Ecuador

ChevronTexaco on Trial in Ecuador

December 2003

This film presents an overview of the campaign to hold Chevron responsable for its activities. While drilling in the Ecuadorian Amazon from 1964 to 1990, Texaco – which merged with Chevron in 2001 – deliberately dumped more than 18 billion gallons of toxic wastewater, spilled roughly 17 million gallons of crude oil, and left hazardous waste in hundreds of open pits dug out of the forest floor.     Read more...

Damage Estimate in Ecuador Lawsuit Mounts to $6 Billion

A new study says the environmental cost of Texaco's oil drilling is higher than thought.
30 October 2003 | Los Angeles Times

Lawyers for about 30,000 Ecuadoreans suing ChevronTexaco Corp. unveiled a new report Wednesday that dramatically upped the total bill for alleged environmental damage as a result of drilling operations to more than $6 billion.     Read more...

Chevron Would Face $5 Billion Tab For Amazon Cleanup, Expert Says

30 October 2003 | Wall Street Journal

Cleaning up toxic wastes in the Ecuadorean Amazon region could cost ChevronTexaco Corp. more than $5 billion and take as long as 10 years, according to a U.S. expert advising the plaintiffs in a lawsuit being tried in this ramshackle, frontier oil town.     Read more...

Testimony Ends in Oil Giant's Ecuador Trial

30 October 2003 | Sacramento Bee

The final stretch of this weeklong trial included testimony from a former minister of Ecuador's Ministry of Mines and Energy - the government division responsible for oil drilling - who caught the weary court audience's attention when he said a Texaco subsidiary knowingly used primitive waste disposal techniques in the 1970s and '80s.     Read more...

Scientist Recommends Petroecuador Face Pollution Trial

29 October 2003 | Associated Press

A Spanish scientist working with plaintiffs in a lawsuit accusing Texaco of polluting part of Ecuador's Amazon jungle said Wednesday that the company's former partner - state-owned Petroecuador - should also face trial.     Read more...

Oil Major Forced to Answer Amazon Charge of Damaging the Environment

29 October 2003 | Financial Times

On the fourth floor of a rundown building in a small town in Ecuador, a courtroom has been freshly painted and newly furnished.     Read more...

Showdown in the Ecuadoran Jungle

Rare Class-Action Pollution Trial Pits Indians Against U.S. Oil Company
23 October 2003 | Washington Post Foreign Service

Under a warm setting sun, a half dozen children gathered Tuesday around a plastic tub filling with water from a tube snaking from the ground. Women washed clothes under the spout, smacking shirts and pants against planks to dry them as the children played.     Read more...

Ecuadorans Put Chevron on Trial

Company Accused in Class-Action Lawsuit of Despoiling Amazon Region with Crude
21 October 2003 | San Francisco Chronicle

A class-action lawsuit against oil giant ChevronTexaco opened today in a small, cinderblock courthouse in a frontier oil town in the Ecuadorian rainforest, charging the company with despoiling the environment with millions of gallons of spilled crude oil during the 1970s and '80s.     Read more...

Bianca Jagger Promotes Lawsuit Against ChevronTexaco in Ecuador

10 October 2003 | Associated Press

Celebrity activist Bianca Jagger criticized U.S. oil company ChevronTexaco, which is being sued by a group of poor Ecuadoreans who say the company\'s past drilling damaged their rainforest homeland.     Read more...

Ecuadoran Wants Chevron to Fix Oil Damage Inflicted on Amazon

Ecuadoran Takes Rain Forest Plea to Chevron
22 May 2003 | The San Francisco Chronicle

Eduardo Silvio Chapal Quintera has traveled more than 3,000 miles by foot, canoe, bus and plane from his village in the Ecuadoran Amazon in hopes of telling ChevronTexaco's CEO David O'Reilly how destructive oil drilling has been to his land and his people.     Read more...

Indigenous Ecuadoreans ask ChevronTexaco to Clean Up Rain Forest

22 May 2003 | Associated Press

Leaders of Ecuadorean indigenous communities who claim ChevronTexaco destroyed their rain forest home during decades of oil drilling have asked residents in the company's own hometown to press for a clean up of the mess.     Read more...

Big Oil's Dirty Secrets

8 May 2003 | The Economist

Even as it celebrates soaring profits-thanks to higher prices during the war-and soaring share prices, now war is over, the oil industry faces a new danger largely of its own creation. It will surprise nobody to learn that oil and ethics mix about as well as oil and water.     Read more...

Suit Says ChevronTexaco Dumped Poisons in Ecuador

8 May 2003 | The New York Times

A group of American lawyers representing more than 30,000 indigenous people in Ecuador filed a $1 billion lawsuit against the ChevronTexaco Corporation yesterday.     Read more...

Ecuadorean Indians Sue Texaco

8 May 2003 | BBC News

A group of Ecuadorean Indians is filing a billion-dollar lawsuit in Quito against the US oil giant, ChevronTexaco. They accuse the company of destroying large areas of rainforest and contaminating local land and rivers.     Read more...

Case in Ecuador Viewed As Key Pollution Fight

U.S. Legal Team Suing ChevronTexaco
6 May 2003 | The Washington Post

For tourists wanting to see the Ecuadoran Amazon, Lago Agrio is a major jumping off point. But the area right around the city of 26,000 has no flora and fauna to speak off, despite being surrounded by what used to be the rain forest.     Read more...

ChevronTexaco Faces Billion-Dollar Lawsuit In Ecuador

2 May 2003 | Dow Jones

A tiny courthouse in an isolated pocket of the Amazon could soon hold the key to a billion-dollar lawsuit against U.S. oil giant ChevronTexaco Corp.     Read more...

ChevronTexaco Faces $5 bln Ecuador Pollution Suit

2 May 2003 | Reuters

ChevronTexaco (CVX.N) next week will begin its defense in a multibillion dollar legal battle in Ecuador against accusations it has polluted portions of the country's Amazon region, the company said.     Read more...

'Sour Lake' Suit Finally Gets Trial

ChevronTexaco Accused of Amazon Dumping
1 May 2003 | San Francisco Chronicle

When Texaco quit drilling in Ecuador in 1992 after nearly 30 years, it left behind what critics describe as an enormous toxic dump of 1.8 million gallons of spilled crude oil -- almost twice the size of the Exxon Valdez spill.     Read more...

2003 Ecuador Legal Complaint

May 2003

This is the legal complaint filed in 2003 in Lago Agrio, after a US appeals court ruled that the case against Chevron should be heard in Ecuador.     Read more...

Executive Summary: Inspection of Lago Agrio Central Station

Having analyzed field data, related documents and lab results, the following can be concluded: Contamination produced by Texaco's operations exists even today. Pollution caused by the Defendant was a result of its sub­par operational practices. And, defendant's pollution is causing risks and damages.     Read more...

Executive Summary: Inspection of Sacha Sur Station

On all three studied sites (3 pits within the station, the marsh that leads to San Carlos and the swamp located southeast of the station), soil and water pollution was found at levels that greatly surpass applicable environmental laws. It was determined that Texaco and its operation of the station is responsible for existing pollution.     Read more...

Executive Summary: Inspection of Shushufindi-18 Well Site

According to the analyzed documents, Texaco was the sole operator of the Shushufindi-18 well. According to Texaco's RAP (Environmental Reparation Plan) and other documents, remediation actions were implemented in one of Shushufindi-18's pits, however, both field and lab results show the existence of contamination in said pit even today. Current levels of contamination found in some pits of the Shushufindi-18 well violate Ecuatorian environmental laws applicable to soils. In some cases, contamination values exceed even the objective standard proposed by the RAP guidelines.     Read more...