UPDATE 2-Brazil slaps Petrobras with record
fine for oil spill
Reuters Company News - August 01, 2000 17:32
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(Updates with Petrobras, Greenpeace quotes)
By Phil Stewart
BRASILIA, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Brazil's government slapped state oil giant
Petrobras with a record fine of nearly $100 million on Tuesday for causing the
country's worst oil spill in 25 years in a disastrous July pipeline rupture.
Environmental agency Ibama said the fine -- the highest-ever imposed for
damage to the ecosystem -- was justified due to Petrobras' inability prevent a
series of oil spills this year, considered a repeated offence by officials.
The state oil Goliath caused four spills since January.
Preferred shares of Petrobras ended 3.12 percent lower in on Tuesday, with
the market closing shortly after the Ibama announcement.
Petrobras' press office declined comment on the fine, saying only: "We have
received (official notice of) the fine and we are studying it."
The latest government sanctions against Petrobras came after a broken pipeline
oozed 1 million gallons (4 million liters) of crude down the Iguacu River in
southern Brazil, contaminating ecological reserves on the banks of the river.
Environmental groups were unimpressed by the fine, saying it represented only
a hiccup in the company's bulging profits and would do little to force it to step
up prevention efforts.
"Don't forget this is a company that turns out more than $60 million a day," said
Greenpeace President Roberto Kishinami.
"This is not going to change Petrobras' relationship with society, or compensate
for the long-term damage to the environment."
Investors also have largely shrugged off the widely expected fine, eyeing instead
Petrobras' impressive oil output and rising net profits as it tries to sell some
$4.4 billion in shares globally.
But the latest series of spills has tarnished Petrobras' image at home and raised
questions in the government about how effective the company is in policing its
vast network.
The most high-profile disaster came in January, when another pipeline rupture
spilled 350,000 gallons (1.3 million liters) of oil into Rio de Janeiro's scenic
Guanabara Bay, killing birds, fish and plants. It was stopped before reaching
Rio's famous beaches of Copacabana and Ipanema.
Ecologists say it will take 10 years for the bay to recover from that disaster.
In June, a Petrobras tanker also dumped almost 100 gallons of oil into the same
bay when it washed out the bilges at the bottom of the ship.
And just this Monday, Petrobras reported a new spill of close to 270 gallons
(1,000 liters) of toxic fuel additive MTBE, the industry acronym for methyl
tertiary butyl ether -- a toxic substance often added to gasoline to boost
combustion rates. It is also known to cause cancer to animals.
Petrobras said there was only a "minimum chance" of the leak contaminating
ground water in Paracambi, a town about 44 miles (70 kilometres) northwest
of Rio de Janeiro. Officials swiftly shut the MTBE pipeline down and said the
company would remove and treat all of the contaminated soil around the
Paracambi site. |
