A picture released by Brazil's National Petroleum Agency shows the oil leak on the ocean floor.

If the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster taught us anything, it’s that Big Oil has been doing very little over the last few decades to prevent oil spills despite their obscene record profits. Companies like Exxon, Chevron, and BP have all clearly decided that it’s more cost effective to use their profits to rig the system in their favor rather than prevent the next oil spill. By using their money to influence politicians and buy favorable public policies, Big Oil companies can limit their liability for the next disaster — which, if you don’t count impacts to the environment and human health, as Big Oil certainly does not, is way cheaper than actually taking adequate precautions.

Chevron’s recent oil spill off the coast of Brazil is another tragic example. Chevron reportedly pumped as much as $4 billion into its drilling operations in Brazil, yet had to be told by Petrobras, Brazil’s state-owned oil company, that its well was spewing oil into the Atlantic Ocean in the first place. Even more shocking, Chevron then had to borrow the sonar equipment to locate exactly where the leak was coming from.

Think about that for a second: Despite spending billions, Chevron didn’t even have the basic equipment to monitor its operations for spills and move quickly to stop oil from leaking into the ocean.

In her recent TED Talk, “Addicted to Risk,” Naomi Klein explains why BP’s oil spill in the Gulf last year and Chevron’s spill off the coast of Brazil are inevitable in the modern economic system, which “cannot survive without perpetual growth and an unending supply of new frontiers”:

BP is as lax about safety precautions as Chevron. Greg Palast’s new book, Vultures’ Picnic, is one of the most maddening things I’ve ever read, as it seeks to get to the bottom of who was responsible for the Deepwater Horizon disaster and uncovers all sorts of malfeasance along the way. In 2006, BP’s pipeline in Alaska dumped over 6,300 barrels of oil in a totally preventable spill. As Palast writes:

The BP/Alyeska pipeline was dripping and ripping. In five years, it had dumped a quarter-million gallons of crude into the tundra. BP’s pipeline is an Exxon Valdez in slow motion. …

Based on the cancers I’d seen in Ecuador, I knew what would happen if this oozing continued. But this is America, not Ecuador, and we don’t let these things happen. So how come it is happening? …

Why is the pipe going to hell? I asked [Inspector Dan Lawn] for just the facts.

“They haven’t pigged it.” That is, they didn’t run the Pipeline Inspection Gauge, the PIG, the robot that runs inside the pipe. If they had, the Smart PIG (one with sensor-feelers) would have squealed at every crack and rusty chunk of the tube.

Sure enough, the records show that 400 miles of the Pipe hadn’t seen a PIG in eight years. Why? It costs up to a million dollars a mile to operate. Four hundred miles, $400 million. BP must have realized it’s cheaper to pay a fine.

All of the recent oil disasters we’ve witnessed are not isolated events. Nor are they mere “accidents.” In their quest for profits, oil companies are eagerly exploiting any new reserve that gets discovered, and the emphasis is always on production, not preservation or even basic caution. The problems at BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig and Chevron’s Frade well off the coast of Rio de Janeiro, in other words, are systemic.

Brazilian officials have, thankfully, been very aggressive in holding Chevron accountable. They’ve already levied at least $28 million in fines against the company, and as the investigation into the causes of the spill and Chevron’s response continues, it’s likely that those fines could reach close to $200 million. That’s pocket change for a company that makes $100 million every day, but Brazilian officials have also been openly discussing jail time for the responsible parties at Chevron, and have even discussed kicking Chevron out of the country altogether. This would be a huge blow to Chevron. There’s a reason the company has sunk billions of dollars into its Brazil operations — the oil fields off Brazil’s coast are one of the most significant discoveries in decades, and are expected to drive growth for the oil industry for years to come.

Chevron’s Brazil spill doesn’t only show the dangers of allowing such a reckless company to expand its offshore drilling operations to new countries, however — it shows the danger of expanding offshore drilling operations at all. Companies like Chevron are focused entirely on production and profits, and are completely unequipped to deal with the inevitable disasters that occur. Indeed, Big Oil seems to accept that dumping toxic oil into fragile ecosystems and paying the resulting fines are a mere cost of doing their dirty business.

That’s why companies like Chevron spend millions on lobbying. Right now, Chevron is spending $1 million a day drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. So it’s no surprise that this past quarter, the company spent over $2 million lobbying every federal agency who might have anything to say about its permits or its response to a spill: “In the July-to-September period, Chevron lobbied Congress, the Executive Office of the President, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Office of Management & Budget, the National Security Council, the U.S. Trade Representative, the Securities & Exchange Commission, the White House, departments of treasury, interior, commerce, energy and state, according to the October report.”

This is as perverse a situation as I can imagine. Like Naomi says, “Life is too precious to be risked for any profit.” Yet Big Oil is not only doing just that, they’re buying their way into making it legal.

Send an email to Brazil’s environmental officials calling on them to throw the book at Chevron. For once, don’t let Chevron get away with its environmental crimes.

Photo: Rogerio Santana, via Reuters

Update 12/14/11 06:42PM PST: This is huge: Brazil is suing Chevron and Transocean for $11 billion over their “lack of planning and environmental management.” The suit also seeks to suspend the companies from operating in the country. Brazilian officials obviously meant it when they vowed not to let Chevron get away with its environmental crimes:

Brazilian prosecutors sued Chevron Corp, the No. 2 U.S. oil company, and top offshore oil rig operator Transocean Ltd for 20 billion reais ($10.6 billion) over their alleged roles in a November oil spill near Rio de Janeiro.

The civil suit filed by federal prosecutors in Rio de Janeiro state also seeks to suspend the companies from operating in Brazil, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement on its website on Wednesday, a move that could halt operations of the 10 Transocean offshore drilling rigs operating in the country.

“During investigations the prosecutors found that Chevron and Transocean were not capable of controlling the damages caused by the leakage,” the statement said. “This is evidence of a lack of planning and environmental management by the companies.”

Update 12/14/11 04:00PM PST: Despite what you may have heard: No, Chevron has not stopped the oil leaking from its well off the coast of Brazil yet.

Update 12/12/11 09:34AM PST: Brazilian officials are not satisfied that Chevron has effectively stopped the oil leak from Frade well:

Chevron Corp., the second-largest U.S. oil company, may need to drill a relief well at its $3.6 billion Frade project in deep water off Brazil’s coast as part of measures to counter a spill.

The cementing at the Frade well that leaked last month currently “doesn’t guarantee 100 percent efficiency,” Magda Chambriard, a director at the regulator known as ANP, told reporters today in Rio de Janeiro. Drilling a relief well is “one possibility” if Chevron doesn’t convince ANP that the cementing is solidly stuck to the ground, Chambriard said.

A decision on the cementing may be reached as early as next week, Chambriard said.

Chevron may have to pay as much as 350 million reais ($193.5 million) in fines and damages for the Nov. 7 leak of at least 2,400 barrels of crude at the Frade project off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.

Update 12/09/11 12:00PM PST:Newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo has quoted Magda Chambriard, a director at the Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency (ANP), as saying the agency has identified 10 different infractions by Chevron in connection with the oil spill.

Update 12/03/11 01:01PM PST: Brazilian officials keep ratcheting up the rhetoric, now threatening to kick Chevron out altogether if it doesn’t fully clean up after itself. Millions of dollars in fines are not much of a punishment to a company that makes about $100 million a day, but being kicked out of Brazil would certainly be a serious blow. There’s a reason Chevron has spent close to $4 billion on its operations there, after all. Brazil’s offshore oil deposits are expected to be a significant source of growth for the entire oil industry in coming decades.

Update 11/25/11 01:27PM PST: Brazil has suspended all of Chevron’s offshore drilling activities while it investigates the companies “negligent” practices and seeks to hold those responsible accountable. Al Jazeera reports:

Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency said it decided to halt Chevron’s drilling rights after determining that there was evidence that the company had been “negligent” in its study of data needed to drill and in contingency planning for abandoning the well in the event of accident.

The agency, known as ANP, also rejected a request from Chevron to drill deeper wells into subsalt areas in the Frade field where the spill took place.

ANP said Chevron Brazil’s activities were to be suspended until “the cause and those responsible for the spill have been identified and safety conditions have been restored in the area”. …

The US company has already been fined $28m by Brazil’s environmental agency for the spill, an amount that is likely to rise as high as $145m when the ANP and Rio’s state government slap fines on the company, as they have pledged to do.

Anyone familiar with the ongoing battle to bring Chevron to justice in Ecuador knows that the company will do everything it can to protect its profits even at the expense of the planet and human health. That’s why it’s so reassuring to see Brazilian officials being so aggressive in holding Chevron responsible. Let Brazilian officials know you’ve got their back as they seek to hold serial polluter Chevron responsible for its environmental crimes.

Update 11/21/11 12:00PM PST: Well here’s something we didn’t even think the company knew how to do: Chevron has officially taken the blame and accepted responsibility for the oil spill off the coast of Brazil.

It’s very likely a strategic move on Chevron’s part, given the things Brazilian officials have been saying about the company’s response to the spill. All of Chevron’s attempts to deflect blame and criticism have failed, and the company must calculate that it’s time to pretend to show some contrition.

Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency says it’s possible that more than 110,000 gallons of oil have spilled into the Atlantic Ocean. Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira announced that Chevron faces at least $28 million in fines, and possibly several more of similar size as more infractions are uncovered. Here’s a roundup of what else Brazilian officials have been saying about holding Chevron accountable:

“We’re going to show this gang that they can’t come here and create whatever environmental mess they want. I want to see the CEO of Chevron swim in that oil.” – Carlos Minc, Rio de Janeiro state environment minister

“There is no doubt that a crime occurred. The spill comes from the drilling activity. What interests me now is to find who is responsible.” – Fabio Scliar, head of the Federal Police department’s environmental affairs division

“We believe the accident could’ve been avoided. There was an environmental crime. They hid information and their emergency team took almost 10 days to start acting.” – Carlos Minc

Some officials have also been pointing out how unprepared Chevron was to deal with an oil spill. Brazil’s state-owned oil company, Petrobras, had to alert Chevron to the existence of the spill in the first place. Worse, Chevron had to borrow sonar equipment from Petrobras to determine the exact location of the spill. “The fact that Chevron had to borrow the equipment also shows that it was unprepared to respond to an emergency,” Fabio Scliar says.

No wonder Chevron has decided it’s time to be proactive about actually taking responsibility.

Update 11/20/11 02:45PM PST: Chevron continues its efforts to protect itself first and foremost. Brazil’s Federal Police are reportedly investigating claims that Chevron is using a technique called sandblasting to disperse the oil, which would minimize the appearance of oil on the surface of the ocean but  endanger marine life.

The Rio Times reports:

Brazil’s Federal Police will investigate claims made by State Environment Secretary Carlos Minc, who has accused oil company Chevron of implementing an illegal sandblasting technique to deal with the slick caused by a recent leak in deep-water oil fields off the Rio de Janeiro coastline….

If the accusations are proven, the U.S. oil giant could face environment crimes charges, which could lead to the company being banned from bidding for contracts for the vast “pre-salt” reserves, and even prison sentences of up to four years, Brazilian media reports….

Another police investigation is already underway into the causes of the incident.

The sandblasting technique can seriously affect marine life as, when mixed with the sand, the oil drops to the seafloor.

If these charges are true, it would be the latest in a string of duplicitous actions taken by Chevron since the spill was first reported. Initially, Chevron claimed the oil spill was the result of natural seepage, not its drilling operations, prompting Brazilian officials to publicly confirm that the spill was Chevron’s fault. Later, Brazil’s Federal Police said that Chevron had violated the terms of its drilling license. Throughout this ordeal, Chevron has drastically understated the size of the spill and overstated the extent of its response.

Update 11/18/11 04:32PM PST: Brazilian officials are now reporting that as much as 2,600 barrels may have leaked into the Atlantic as a result of Chevron’s spill. An official with Brazil’s Federal Police is also saying that Chevron apparently violated the terms of its drilling permit. According to the AP:

Nearly 110,000 gallons of oil may have spilled into the Atlantic Ocean because of a leak at an offshore Chevron drilling site, Brazil’s environmental protection agency said Friday.

Officials think between 8,400 to 13,800 gallons of oil leaked each day from Nov. 8 through Tuesday, Ibama said in a statement on its website. Chevron had said that only 16,800 to 27,300 gallons in total leaked into the ocean.

Officials are still investigating the cause of the leak, which has been almost entirely contained, but the Ibama statement said it was a result of drilling.

An official at Brazil’s Federal Police, which has opened an investigation into the spill, said Chevron “drilled about 500 meters (1,640 feet) farther than they were licensed to do.” The official, who agreed to discuss the matter only if not quoted by name, said that information came from a person with knowledge of the drilling.

The leak occurred at a drilling site about 230 miles (370 kilometers) northeast of Rio de Janeiro.

Rio state Environment Minister Carlos Minc said earlier he was sure the leak was larger than Chevron estimated and he called for more transparency from the company.

“We can’t trivialize this,” he told the Globo TV network. “It’s really serious and we don’t yet know all the consequences.”

Marine life in the area of the spill will be affected by the leak, Minc said, adding that whales are migrating from north to south through the spill area.

The oil slick, which was moving away from the coast, grew to 11 miles (18 kilometers), Ibama said. Most of the oil was concentrated around the drilling rig in a layer about 3 feet (1 meter) thick.

Update 11/18/11 09:07AM PST: More reports are surfacing of Chevron attempting to deceive Brazilian officials and the public about the extent of its oil spill off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.

Chevron has claimed that somewhere between 400 and 650 barrels of oil has been spilled, and that the leak is contained. But Ana Carolina Oliveira, a spokeswoman for Brazil’s oil regulator, the National Petroleum Agency, told the Associated Press that an estimated 1,000 barrels had leaked to the surface and that it was still unclear if the leak was contained. And as the San Francisco Chronicle reports, satellite imagery shows that the oil spill extends some 918 square miles across the surface of the ocean, leading SkyTruth, a nonprofit that specializes in using satellite imagery to assess environmental problems, to theorize that the spill rate as of Tuesday might have been up to 3,738 barrels per day — almost 10 times what Chevron is reporting.

Here’s the map put together by SkyTruth:

Brazilian officials reiterated that Chevron could face severe penalties as a result of this spill and its insufficient response: “If Chevron is not doing what it should (to contain the spill) it will be severely punished,” Mines and Energy Minister Edison Lobao said Thursday.

Taken together with the fact that Chevron’s claim that it has 18 ships on hand to clean up the spill was directly contradicted by Brazil’s Federal Police agency, which did a flyover of the area and only observed 1 ship doing cleanup, it seems Chevron is in full disaster containment mode — that is, containment of the public relations disaster. As usual, Chevron is placing public perception and how that might affect its future operations and profits above the health of the planet.

It’s easy to see why: The drilling contractor for Chevron’s Frade oil well, which is the source of the spill, is none other than Transocean, the company that actually owned the drilling rig that exploded and sank in April 2010, causing BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster. Chevron is probably desperately trying to fend off anyone making that connection. But as DeSmog Blog’s Farron Cousins points out, the similarities are just too eerie to ignore.

Update 11/17/11 10:22AM PST: Brazil’s Federal Police agency has announced that it is investigating the spill, and said in a statement that those responsible could be facing up to 5 years in prison.

According to CNN, Chevron has been fairly duplicitous in reporting the extent of the leak and its response:

Chevron told [Brazil's Oil and Gas Regulator (ANP)] that 18 vessels were on the scene to take care of the clean-up. But according to the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper, Federal Police did a fly-over of the site Tuesday and saw only one vessel.
“The reports do not correspond with the reality of the facts,” Fabio Scliar, from the police environment department, told Folha de Sao Paulo. “I want to understand what happened.”

ANP said the spill is dispersing and moving away from the Brazilian coast, so it does not appear to threaten Rio’s world-famous beaches. But it does raise questions about how prepared Brazil is for the development of its offshore “pre-salt” deposits, which are expected to turn the country into a major oil exporter in the coming years.

Original Post: After Chevron tried to blame it on natural seepage for a week, officials have confirmed that the oil spill off the Brazilian coast is in fact the result of Chevron’s operations at its Frade well.

Of course, attempting to minimize the damage of its operations in an effort to evade responsibility is nothing new for Chevron. I probably don’t need to even type the word Ecuador here, because you’re probably already thinking it, too.

Every single oil spill Chevron is responsible for but tries to downplay should be a cause of deep concern to all rational human beings on this planet. Chevron is attempting to expand operations everywhere from the Gulf of Mexico to Kurdistan. If you think Chevron would take any more responsibility for an oil spill in the Gulf than it has for its 18 billion gallons of toxic oil waste in the Ecuadorean Amazon, you’re fooling yourself.

To illustrate my point: Chevron has invested $43 billion in its liquid natural gas project, called Gorgon, on Barrow Island off the Western coast of Australia. Environmentalists in Australia were horrified when the project was proposed and protested vigorously to stop Chevron from being allowed to move forward with it, their main argument being that Barrow Island is home to a number of threatened animal species and even several that exist only that island.

It will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with Chevron’s typical mode of operations that over 1,550 of these rare and threatened animals have been killed so far by the company’s operations. And that’s just what the company has officially reported. But don’t worry, a Chevron spokesman assures us that the company has “a range of measures in place to limit the impact of construction activities on the environment, including lowering speed limits to 40km/h during dusk and dawn when the animals are most active.” Doesn’t do much for all the dead animals, but isn’t it reassuring to know that Chevron is at least pretending to care?

I guess we should be somewhat impressed that Chevron isn’t trying to deny that it’s killing these animals the way it tried to deny it was at fault for the oil slick off Brazil’s coast. The fact that Chevron initially tried to say it wasn’t at fault just shows that the company is determined to never take responsibility for the impacts of its business operations and will use any means necessary to evade cleaning up after itself, just like in Ecuador.

Greenpeace protesters at Chevron's offices in Rio de Janeiro with a banner reading "Your mess, our problem."

So the question becomes: How much longer are countries around the world going to let this rapacious, greedy company enter their borders in its unending quest for profit? An Australian reporter already asked a Chevron spokesmanstraight up, “Why should we trust you?” How many more countries will ask the same exact question when Chevron comes knocking?

Seems like that’s a question Chevron management needs to be asking themselves, too — but somehow I get the feeling their too busy counting their fat stacks of obscene profits instead.

Having attended the Encontro Xingu: Vivo Para Sempre” or “Xingu Encounter: Alive Forever” gathering in Altamira, Brazil in May 2008 with thousands in opposition to the Belo Monte dam, including my friends Zachary Hurwitz, Scott Fitzmorris and the late Glenn Switkes, I know the struggle is not over. I commit to doing everything I can to supporting communities in Brazil to stop this dam. Please join me and my friends at Amazon Watch and International Rivers today!

Sunrise on the Xingu River taken by Scott Fitzmorris

Brazilian Government Shoves Belo Monte Down Our Throats Ahead of Campaign Season
By Zachary Hurwitz

In July 2009, Lula da Silva promised his personal friend and Bishop of the Xingú Dom Erwin Krautler, as well as Professor Celio Bermann of the University of São Paulo, and representatives of affected indigenous and riverine communities that “we will not force Belo Monte down anyone’s throat,” But on February 1st, the Brazilian environmental agency IBAMA did just that, releasing the first of three environmental licenses required to build the Belo Monte mega-dam on the Xingu River.

IBAMA’s Provisional License approves the project’s environmental assessment (EIA), written by Brazil’s state-run electric company Eletrobras, while imposing 40 corrective mitigating conditions that will cost R$1.5 billion (US$ 794 million) to implement. In order to mitigate the dam’s social and environmental impacts and obtain an Installation License to break ground on what will be the world’s 3rd largest dam, the construction consortium that wins the project’s auction on March 30th must meet these 40 conditions.

Carlos Minc, who is expected to leave his post as Brazil’s Environment Minister this month to run for public office in Rio de Janeiro later in the year, stated that the imposition of 40 conditions proves that Belo Monte is the “most socio-environmentally advanced dam in the history of Brazil.” Meanwhile, critics like Raul Telles do Valle of Brazil’s Socio-Environmental Institute (ISA) have been quick to point out the obvious: if an environmental assessment needs 40 conditions to be approved, then it’s most likely one of the worst environmental assessments written in the country’s history.

Indeed, it appears the project’s incomplete environmental assessment was rammed through IBAMA simply to obtain the agency’s rubber stamp of approval. In November 2009 two prominent IBAMA technicians were removed from the EIA for voicing their opposition to the poor quality and rushed timeline of the EIA, which they later stated was driven by political pressure from the top. In another case, six IBAMA technicians signed a letter voicing concern that Belo Monte’s impacts to the Xingu river basin and riverine and indigenous communities had not been adequately studied, nor had these communities sufficiently participated in public hearings.

In September 2009, 40 highly respected international technical specialists and academic experts produced a report that highlighted significant errors in the EIA and the current design of Belo Monte however, the 40 conditions that IBAMA has imposed on the provisional license hardly do justice to the lacuna in the EIA. Instead, the agency has buckled once again – as it did in approving the environmental licenses of the highly controversial Santo Antônio and Jirau mega-dams of the Madeira River Complex in Brazil’s Rondônia state – to a political agenda and timetable that appear to have been determined well before the environmental assessments were ever written.

Clearly, Belo Monte’s timetable, and that of 70 other large dam projects planned for the Amazon has been in the works since José Sarney (1985-1990) took office as the first democratically elected president since 1964. The history of patronage, corruption, and fraud that has played out since Sarney distributed strategic posts in Brazil’s “hydroelectocracy” to his supporters has set the stage for Belo Monte’s politically expedited provisional license. Sarney’s bloc of supporters in the country’s electric and corporate sectors, including Dilma Roussef, Lula’s Chief of Staff and hand-picked successor for this year’s election, owe their political lives to him want Belo Monte built at any cost.

Make no mistake: the provisional license was approved this week– lacking a complete and rigorous environmental assessment, while denying the people of the Xingú their right to free, prior and, informed consent (FPIC)—because of an election timeline. In part it boosts Dilma Rousseff’s campaign for President: a Dilma win would most likely assure a continuation of the marriage between Sarneyists and the PT agenda on social spending that has characterized the Lula administration since 2005. On the other hand, a José Serra win (of the right-wing PSDB) on October 3rd would swing the country’s economic policies back to the right, a risk to the PT’s social agenda.

Meanwhile, Amazon defender and Green Party candidate Marina Silva, running 8% in polls, has criticized Belo Monte for lacking a coherent socio-environmental plan to support the people of the Xingú. Yet both front runners – Serra and Rousseff – have a strong interest in building Belo Monte and many more mega-dams in the Amazon to keep hydroelectricity profits flowing into industry and government coffers. These establishment candidates – and their devotees like Environmental Minister Carlos Minc – will undoubtedly continue to play lip service to “sustainable development,” while offering wholly inadequate mitigation schemes; 40 conditions for a Provisional License will not prevent impending disasters like Belo Monte.

The strength and unity of the Xingú River’s inhabitants, as well as the Brazilian and international environmental movement, have delayed Belo Monte since the José Sarney administration took power 25 years ago. As we watch the provisional license being shoved down the throats of the people of the Xingú, and as light continues to be shed on Lula’s ties to the Sarney political machine, it’s more important than ever to stop Belo Monte. The people of the Xingú, the Amazon, and the world depend on it. We cannot wait for more politicians to take office only to buckle under pressure. The time to stop Belo Monte for good is now.

Zachary Hurwitz has a Masters degree in Geography from the University of Texas, Austin, and has worked on energy issues in the Amazon Basin since 2006.

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Bunge was clearly expecting us. When Judson Barros (director of the NGO FUNAGUS in Piauí, Brazil) and I entered the Sofitel and walked to the check-in for the shareholder meeting, they treated us like VIP’s that they were expecting. The three people at the table looked at our proxy letters and one mumbled, “Oh, yes, these are the letters we heard about.”

We were promptly handed over shareholder badges and invited to climb the stairs to delight in some breakfast before the meeting got started. I couldn’t help but notice the scant number of people present, and the rather small meeting room that we would be sitting in. It was by far the smallest shareholder meeting that I’ve ever attended with a total of 50-60 people total.

The meeting proceeded as expected with an introduction by CEO Alberto Weisser, then a review of the meeting rules, voting, and a powerpoint presentation on the company. Voting results were announced (all resolutions passed), and then the meeting opened to Q&A. By the way, the resolutions up for voting had absolutely zero social or environmental content. They addressed mundane H.R. issues.

Judson stood up during the Q&A period and read a statement about Bunge’s ongoing disrespect for environmental laws in Brazil, specifically in the state of Piauí where he is from. In Piauí, Bunge uses native wood from the Cerrado—a super biodiverse savannah—for 100 percent of their energy needs in all their soy processing plants. In March of this year, three Federal Court Justices in Brasilia, Brazil ruled that Bunge must stop cutting and burning wood from the Cerrado. But, Bunge continues to operate with total disregard for this ruling and for the environment—burning wood in its plant.

After Judson spoke, an older gentleman stood up and stated that he owned 600 shares in Bunge, and that he urged the company to take seriously every word of Judson’s statement. He went on to state that he believes that as an industry leader the company has the responsibility to make big steps forward to respect the environment and be responsible in their practices. The CEO merely looked at him and said, “Thank you.”