The world’s most lucrative fossil fuel company plans to seek out new undersea energy reserves during peak whale mating season off the coast of South Africa.
As if Shell’s practices couldn’t get any worse, the company has just begun a new oil-seeking venture off the coast of South Africa – despite being aware that whales circulate in nearby waters.
To find these potential reserves of energy, Shell will be creating countless underwater explosions and using ocean vessels to search for possible areas of interest. It plans to fully launch the project on December 1st.
Though these explosions occur in the deep sea, the unimaginably loud shock waves will travel through 3km of water and at least 40km into the Earth’s crust.
It doesn’t take a genius to imagine the harm this causes to the ecosystems located on the seabed. But when Shell is championing the most environmentally destructive industry of all, can we really be surprised that this is the least of its concerns?
Locals are concerned though, saying that the explosions will cause panic and damage to whales, dolphins, seals, penguins, and even smaller animals like crabs as the ships fire air guns underwater every 10 seconds over the next five months.
Bear in mind that most dolphins and whales have a hearing capacity of up to 800km, meaning a loud blast at distances that seem far away could be incredibly disorienting, frightening, and possibly deadly.
Making matters worse, humpback whales have been documented in the Wild Coast’s waters around this time of year, as it is peak mating season for the species.
Unfortunately, this is the exact area where vessels are currently scouring for oil hotspots. Whale pods could be injured – or worse – as they begin their migration back to Antarctica.
Although deep sea drilling is not set to take place just yet, members of Cape Town’s Extinction Rebellion are outraged at the amount of sea destruction and pollution this project will create in its early stages alone.
A South African resident, Tracy Carter, said ‘To give you an idea about the Wild Coast, where my family comes from, it is the most incredibly breath-taking place one could ever dream of. The ocean is lush and abundant with sea life in all shapes and sizes.’
If substantial underwater energy reserves are discovered here, the company will surely not hesitate to extract them for sale, leading to the continued utilisation of more carbon-emitting fossil fuels.
Science has shown that tapping into new reserves would – without question – push us over our 1.5C global temperature limit. Not to mention, this novel fossil fuel hunt comes less than a month after COP26, where world leaders agreed that the time to move toward sustainable energy is now.
Cape Town’s ‘Oceans Not Oil’ coalition has started a petition urging South Africa’s Minister of Environment to revoke Shell’s permit, which was approved in 2014 before the country’s new environmental protection policies were put in place.
The petition already has over 390,000 signatures and is rapidly amassing more.
In response to this backlash, Shell has stated: ‘the impacts are well understood and mitigated against when performing seismic surveys,’ and continued denying any negative environmental impacts of its work by saying, ‘There is no indication that seismic surveys are linked to (whale and dolphin) strandings.’
Shell can continue with this narrative of denial, but the people of South Africa – and the rest of the world – know better.
The current goal of Cape Town’s locals is to inform as many people as possible about the ‘heinous acts’ being committed by Shell in order to get the project scrapped completely.
Let’s hope we hear a positive development on this very soon. Until then, power to the people!
I’m Jessica (She/Her). I’m the Deputy Editor & Content Partnership Manager at Thred. Originally from the island of Bermuda, I specialise in writing about ocean health and marine conservation, but you can also find me delving into pop culture, health and wellness, plus sustainability in the beauty and fashion industries. Follow me on Twitter, LinkedIn and drop me some ideas/feedback via email.
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