It is with great regret that Oil Free Otago report they have no more oil companies to chase away from the southern ocean. 

“What are we going to do with ourselves?” said Dunedin grandmother Rosemary Penwarden. 

“Anadarko, Shell, OMV, Beach Energy and now New Zealand Oil And Gas (NZOG) have all run away.

“Who’s left to chase? Now that our albatross breeding grounds are protected from the risk of catastrophic oil spills, can we finally go back to weeding the garden and looking after the grandchildren?

“Wait. We still face extinction.”

NZ Oil And Gas CEO Andrew Jeffries today regrets the “perfect storm” that led to his surrender of the Barque prospect 60km off the coast of Oamaru – “…adverse regulatory settings; the dry hole at OMV’s Tawhaki permit; the recent announcement terminating Wherry-1 drilling; and the effects of Covid on drill rig costs and availability making the task of finding suitable partners in the required timeline impossible.”

“Not once did he mention the climate chaos that the rest of us are concerned about” said Penwarden.

“Not once did he wonder at the logic displayed by his “suitable partners” at exploring for unburnable oil and gas in the midst of a climate emergency.” 

Oil Free Otago would like to wish Mr Jeffries the best of luck finding a proper job, one that aligns with a liveable planet rather than destroying it, and stopping his industry’s wilful disregard of all our futures. 

ENDS

Rosemary Penwarden 0221856966

OMG, OMV are getting the F… OUT of the GSB! Haere ra OMV! Let’s celebrate!

We’re so lucky to live alongside this wild ocean and be surrounded by the amazing creatures that call it home. If you can, take some time at the beach, in the water, by your favourite spot overlooking the southern ocean, and celebrate!

Here at Oil Free Otago we have not a skerrick of sympathy for OMV, but it’s been a tough few months for them – and ok, we’ll take some credit for that. We’ve helped hold up their henchboat the Skandi Atlantic in Timaru, blockade their New Plymouth office and sent heaps of letters over the years telling them to bugger off.

Then, after a sneaky journey over New Year (through smoke from the Australian bush fires) to get to their Great South Basin drill site the crew of the giant COSL Prospector went and cut off their own drill shaft.

The COSL Prospector was talked up by the industry – the grandest drill rig ever to reach these parts, built for harsh North Sea conditions, kept in place by a dynamic positioning system of 6 fixed pitch, variable speed thrusters (DP3). Woops, that sawn off drill replacement must have cost a pretty penny.

The COSL Prospector’s first NZ job was for Tamarind Resources off the Taranaki Coast last year. That didn’t last long when part way through the contract Tamarind went broke, owing local Taranaki suppliers around $360 million.

Now this. Broken drill shaft. No oil. No gas.

Now this! Now, two thirds of the world’s albatrosses – represented on our Oil Free Otago logo – along with southern right whales, penguins, NZ sea lions and other unique and endangered creatures, are safe from Austrian oil giant predator OMV’s invasion of their home.

But – our work isn’t over. All of our futures remain endangered by the continued exploration for more oil and gas anywhere in the world in the midst of a climate emergency. People get the connection between Australia’s horrific fires, the unprecedented Southland floods, for 2 examples, and OMV’s search for more oil and gas that will only worsen climate breakdown.

We know we can’t burn most of what’s already on the books of OMV and their oil industry mates and retain a liveable future.

And we know that people power can make a difference. OMV: you’re not off the hook.

It’s great to see the OMV rig and their four henchboats exit our southern ocean. Now it’s time for them to exit Aotearoa NZ altogether. Haere ra OMV.

 

 

Flotilla and Send-off to OMV rig – Update

Oil Free Otago & Extinction Rebellion along with School Strike for Climate students are calling on boat-owning Boomers to help them sail to OMV’s oil rig – 160 kilometres off the coast of the South Island.  We want to send a flotilla to sail off the coast of Otago to meet OMV’s oil rig in the open ocean. The COSL Prospector is currently in the Great South Basin conducting deep sea oil drilling. (PLEASE NOTE, we’re still searching for a vessel to get us there so have put off the send-off date to give us more time to pull together an awesome flotilla. Please help us find yachts).

We’re going to bear witness to OMV’s crimes against the climate. And to take a stand for climate justice and the life-giving waters that surround us. So far Aotearoa has had huge success with pushing big oil companies out of our waters – but it’s not over yet.

We need you! And WE NEED YACHTS capable of sailing in deep water. Ask your aunties, uncles, bosses, grandmas – who is up for an adventure? The drill site is 160km from Port Chalmers. That’s where we’re going. It’s going to be exciting, and it’s going to be hard. We will confront the rig and expose their actions. The voyage will be around 3-4 days. We don’t intend to enter the non-interference zone and do not anticipate criminal charges for skippers and participants. We are looking for people of all ages and backgrounds to join us.

We’ll keep up our search for vessels for as long as OMV stay in the Great South Basin.

We’re also looking for people to gather for the flotilla’s send off in Carey’s Bay once we’re ready to go. We want you there in style to give the flotilla a cracker send off. Bring down your kayaks, surfboards, paddleboards, dinghies, small boats, big boats, yacht or anything that floats, to accompany the flotilla towards the open ocean. We also need people onshore with colourful banners, cupcakes, music, voices – anything that makes this send off fun and colourful. As this action relies on a good weather window we need to be prepared to shift the date if needs be, so please keep an eye on this page, we’ll be posting more details and updates.

****Email us ASAP omvflotilla@protonmail.com if you:
a) have a yacht/vessel or know a keen person who has one
b) if you would like to be considered to join the flotilla (spaces will depend on the number of boats we can confirm)
c) if you would like to help in a organisational role on land or at sea – we need people power!

Check our FB event, or email ASAP omvflotilla@protonmail.com for more info.https://www.facebook.com/events/258565398452153

The rebellion mostly runs on love, but we sometimes need a bit of money too for gear and supplies etc. If you can donate a bit, please do so here: givealittle.co.nz/cause/extinction-rebellion. Thanks!

This is a big undertaking, and it will take a lot of energy, passion, people power and just a bit of luck to pull it off. When did that ever stop us?

Join us. Stop deep sea oil.

• Extinction Rebellion Ōtautahi Christchurch
• 
  Extinction Rebellion Ōtepoti Dunedin, Otago
• 
  Oil Free Otago
• 
  Extinction Rebellion Invercargill

Oil Free Otago Media Release 18 December 2019

Oil Free Otago said this morning that Jacinda Ardern’s government’s granting OMV consent to drill in the Great South Basin is a slap in the face for all who care about the climate crisis.

“Are we serious about the climate crisis or not?” asks Oil Free Otago’s Rosemary Penwarden. “If we are, then plans to drill for new oil and gas must cease immediately.

“Instead, this Government’s Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) just gave OMV the green light to drill for unburnable oil and gas in one of the world’s most marginal and treacherous oceans.

“That’s a slap in the face to all who care about the climate crisis and our future.”

OMV have consent to drill up to ten exploratory wells in the Great South Basin this summer, to similar depth as the Deepwater Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 that exploded and devastated that part of the world. Wind speeds and ocean waves, already some of the biggest ever recorded, are incresing in the region due to climate change.

The EPA said that climate change could not be considered in their decision.

“The EPA has not kept up with reality” said Ms Penwarden. “At just over one degree of global warming predicted changes are occurring far sooner than expected. How can the EPA morally allow more climate destruction in the face of this climate crisis? Australia is burning, yet this government agency turns the other way.”

“How can Jacinda Ardern’s government come back from Madrid, touting themselves as climate leaders, and allow new deep sea drilling in our pristine southern ocean? That is hypocritical and deeply disappointing.”

“OMV and this government should know that Oil Free Otago and the people of the south will continue to oppose this unethical and illogical decision. We are building a resilient future. OMV has no place in that future.”

Would you let your child run onto the road in front of on-coming traffic? Or would you grab him, yell STOP, and scold him for putting himself and others in danger, like a responsible adult would?

Or would you politely ask him to consider staying off the road? Or just stand there, hoping that bloody great truck will swerve out of his way?

The oil and gas industry is far from being an innocent child but is behaving just as recklessly. And that bloody great truck? It’s heading for us all. The climate crisis is coming at us like a Kenworth T909 with failing brakes while oil companies act like reckless fools, drilling for more oil and gas, oblivious to the consequences. Are their heads that far underground that they can’t see what they’ve done to the atmosphere?

Last week PEPANZ (Petroleum Exploration and Production Association of NZ) and NZPAM (NZ Petroleum and Minerals), part of our government’s Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment, hosted the 2019 NZ Petroleum Conference at the Millenium Hotel, Queenstown. The two day conference showcased international companies’ latest technology like Houston-based Oceaneering’s E-ROV and Schlumberger’s Full-waveform Inversion imaging equipment. It’s also where MBIE announced that almost all the remaining un-permitted land in Taranaki is up for drilling and fracking.

Why Queenstown? Because the Petroleum Conference was chased away from Auckland, Wellington and New Plymouth in recent years by a large number of adults loudly yelling STOP to the reckless kids inside, forcing PEPANZ to hide in Queenstown and keep this year’s conference a secret.

But we adults from Oil Free Otago, Extinction Rebellion Queenstown-Lakes and Environmental Justice Otepoti among others, found them and dropped everything to travel to Queenstown (some by bicycle via the Central Otago rail trail) to again yell STOP to these reckless fools.

We’ve given up asking nicely. Exxon and others – including Austrian oil giant OMV, due to drill in the Great South Basin off Dunedin this summer – have known about climate change for more than thirty years and used that time to fund misinformation campaigns discrediting climate science.

Our message was loud and clear: we won’t stand by while you continue to endanger our future. So loud in fact, that conference delegates, required by PEPANZ to stay in-house for the duration of the conference for their “safety and security”, had two interrupted nights’ sleep and noisy colourful protestors outside their conference by day. Who said you can’t have a little fun delivering your deadly serious message? That’s where the fireworks came in. On the final night of the conference around two in the morning, just after a couple of wobbly-legged female delegates spilled out of their taxi and found their way to their beds, just as a car alarm started up somewhere very close by, an 8-Shot Roman Candle lit up the Queenstown sky.

Jacinda’s response to Extinction Rebellion’s disruption in Wellington on 7 October was,  sure, protest is fine but let’s not interrupt people going about their normal business.

I’m thrilled that she sees climate change as her generation’s nuclear free moment and has banned new offshore drilling permits. But I’m worried that part of her government, NZPAM, still don’t see that bloody great truck.

Rosemary Penwarden – climate activist, mother and grandmother (This article first appeared in the Whanganui Chronicle behind a paywall)

The Government calls climate change our generations ‘nuclear-free moment’. Councils across the country have declared a ‘climate emergency’. Thousands of students dare to protest for the right to a future.

Yet on Wednesday, the Government’s so-called ‘Environmental Protection Authority’ granted Austrian oil giant OMV their only publicly-notified consent they need to drill off the coast of Dunedin. OMV is the definition of what we call a ‘climate criminal’ – one of the biggest oil giants in the world, now planning to expand oil and gas drilling into some of New Zealand’s most wild and pristine seas, close to the breeding and foraging ground of southern right and humpback whales, bottlenose dolphins and rare New Zealand sea lions.

Yet somehow, the EPA have just gotten OMV one consent closer to drilling off our coast – a decision made after ‘considering’ desperate pleas from 215 submitters, and over six thousand signatories demanding the consent application be declined.

The hearing itself was farcical. Submitters were barred from speaking about Te Tiriti O Waitangi, the founding document of our nation, and barred also from mentioning climate change, the biggest threat to this nation. The only expert on marine ecology was dismissed and told her evidence was ‘irrelevant’. Media were barred from recording the hearing and made to feel unwelcome by glaring security guards. Submitters were ridiculed, patronised, and sent out of the hearing in floods of tears.

All of this is so incredible it would be laughable if it wasn’t threatening our very existence. The blame doesn’t simply rest with the EPA – they operate within the boundaries of a piece of legislation (the Exclusive Economic Zone and Continental Shelf (Environmental Effects) Act 2012), which, like the Resource Management Act, includes clauses which explicitly bar climate change from consideration. Yep – you read that right – the laws intended to protect our environment actually prevent decisionmakers from thinking about climate change. The Government’s planned reforms of this legislation isn’t due to be completed for years – yet these particular clauses could be repealed in the blink of an eye. Dozens of environmental and human rights groups – along with Local Government New Zealand – have just sent the Minister for the Environment David Parker an open letter, urging him to repeal these ridiculous clauses barring authorities from considering climate change.

There is real ambition from the public and from organisations and unions of every kind, but they’ve been dismissed as radical, deemed not politically possible. But long-term thinking is not radical. What’s radical is to alter the planet’s climate, betray the future of my generation, and condemn millions to death by climate change. What’s radical, is following the bidding of a few recalcitrant industries while tens of thousands of students protest outside Parliament’s door. What’s radical, is to write off the fact that change is within our reach.

Politicians have been arguing about climate change all of my life. But throughout those 7,406 days, they’ve failed to peak our emissions, failed to adapt to the impacts of climate change, and failed to provide meaningful climate finance to the Pacific.

This is why we don’t expect Minister Parker, or any politician for that matter, to take meaningful action on these issues. We’re not here to beg them to change the law or tell big oil they’re not welcome in Aotearoa – because we know that they will do neither of these things. The time for begging is over, and the time for change has come. Next Friday, that change will look like dozens of thousands of Kiwis marching on Parliament – not begging for a future, or even demanding one, but telling politicians that their time has expired – and our time has come.

——-

https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/omv-granted-consent-drill-oil-exploration-well

After a long battle, oil giant OMV have been granted the only publicly-notified consent they need to drill off our local Dunedin’s coastline.
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/09/20/817714/the-unknown-loophole-that-could-stymie-zero-carbon-bill

It’s at the Millenium Hotel Queenstown Sunday 29 Sept – Tuesday 1 Oct

Despite the ban on new deep sea oil permits, school student climate strikes, heatwaves, droughts, cyclones and fires from the Amazon to the arctic, the oil industry is planning to keep destroying the world for short term profit.

They tried to keep this year’s conference a secret, but we tracked them down.

Come and join us to remind them: Business As Usual is over

All welcome, please help… it’s our future!!!

Join the “Stop The Petroleum Conference (forever)” https://www.facebook.com/events/2403544013034491/

or email earthprotectorsrising@protonmail.com

We are a small group of volunteers prepared to put our bodies in the way to stop this industry, for the sake of all our futures. If you are able, we are grateful for any donation, no matter how small

Oil Free Otago

Kiwibank 38-9015-0104292-00

Thank you!

“Stay Away from the  Great South Basin (GSB)” was the message loud and clear from Oil Free Otago at St Clair beach today (Saturday 18 May).  

OMV is planning an exploratory drill in permit PEP50119 in deep water about 150 km from Dunedin as early as this summer.The Austrian oil giant purchased Shell’s remaining assets there last year for $790 million.

“Today all over the world people like us remember the Deepwater Horizon oil catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico by joining hands across the sand. OMV’s planned drill is exploratory and in deep water, just like the Deepwater Horizon was. But OMV’s planned drill is in more treacherous marginal conditions. Help is nowhere near. OMV can never exclude the risk of a catastrophic oil spill or gas blowout” said Oil Free Otago’s Rosemary Penwarden.

“Our bodies form a symbolic line in the sand to say No More to fossil fuel exploration in our oceans.”

A letter to OMV was signed at the event and Oil Free Otago is gathering a ready response team of people to oppose OMV at short notice.

“We are building up a team to oppose OMV with harbour blockades and the like. We are serious about protecting our southern ocean, our way of life and our children’s future. OMV has no place here.”

—

Here’s our letter:

18 May 2019

Alan Clare

Exploration and Appraisal Manager,

OMV New Zealand

The Magestic Centre

100 Willis St

Wellington 6011

We, the undersigned, demand that OMV surrender their Great South Basin permit PEP 50119 immediately.

We, the people of Dunedin, Otago, have again gathered to oppose your company OMV’s intention to drill for oil and gas in our southern ocean.

We have written to you before but you are not listening. As we have already told you, New Zealanders have a strong history of resistance wherever we see injustice. The biggest injustice facing us today is the breakdown of our climate system. 

Since we last wrote cities around the world have declared a climate emergency, including Christchurch and Nelson in Aotearoa NZ. School children have walked out of school in their thousands to demand a liveable future. Average atmospheric CO2 concentrations at Mauna Loa observatory have reached 415ppm. This January the US Midwest froze while Australia burned, while five months earlier 11 massive wildfires raged within the arctic circle.  

The Great South Basin is marginal, dangerous and infinitely precious to us. We cannot burn most of the already discovered oil and gas to stay within a survivable limit of global warming. As each day passes your intention to drill for more unburnable oil and gas becomes more untenable. It is madness. It is both unjust and immoral. We will resist you every step of the way.

We humans face the future together. Your children as well as ours will suffer from continuing burning of fossil fuels, keeping your heads in the sand and continuing with Business as Usual. Your industry belongs in the past. Why not, instead of wasting more money on exploring for a stranded asset in an inhospitable ocean, help us all by investing in a fairer, non carbon energy future?

Yours sincerely

Oil Free Otago 

1 May 2019

We Made Them Cake!

What a great turnout on Monday at our OMV Unwelcome rally. OMV were planning to present their upcoming plans to drill in the Great South Basin in a closed meeting with Dunedin City and Otago Regional Councillors. But some of the Councillors said they would not go.

As a thank you to them, for standing alongside us and speaking up against OMV, we baked them a cake! ♥

Here’s what the Councillors said

ORC:

• Cr Deaker said he wanted to do “nothing to support or encourage any fossil fuel industry, in Otago or anywhere”. I want a wonderful future for our grandchildren and they won’t have that unless climate change is stopped.”
• Cr Scott said he preferred to ”establish plans for the future, not the past.”
• Cr Laws said he never makes “450km round trips to suit the interests of public relations promoters when they could just email their propaganda like most paid lobbyists do.”
• Cr Ella Lawton said she would be going, to be informed, but was ”adamantly against” the plans.

DCC:

•  Cr Hawkins said he saw ”little value” in the briefing, as there was ”nothing they could say to convince me that the environmental and economic aspirations of our community are well served by more deep-sea drilling”.
• Cr Damien Newell, said ”if I go, it will be in protest. The science is in – there’s nothing they can tell us. He said he was ”absolutely philosophically opposed to the offshore drilling”, which was just ”wilful and wanton damage for our environment and our planet. It’s just madness.”
• Crs Garey and Jim O’Malley would attend, despite their opposition to drilling, to hear from the company, ask questions and express their concerns and those of the community. Cr O’Malley said ”If I don’t like the answer, I’m going to leave immediately.”

Mayor Cull is in China but last week wrote to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to reiterate the DCC was ”strongly opposed” to offshore drilling.

It’s a strange and wonderful thing to have elected councillors actually reflecting the will of so many of us, and speaking out. This is a far cry from the Anadarko days in 2013-14, when it seemed almost no one in power could see past the company spin.

Even so, we have the fight of our lives coming up, friends, against one of the biggest and most powerful companies in the world. OMV is one of 100 companies responsible for 70% of the world’s emissions.

Last week Dunedin was hailed as having the biggest uptake of private electric cars per capita in NZ; all those emissions savings mean nothing if we allow this company to drill off our coast.

We think OMV need to know about the proud history of peaceful civil disobedience in Aotearoa and we hope you will join us to teach them. When we see injustice, we act. Drilling for unburnable oil and gas is unjust and in Cr Newell’s words, just madness.

As summer approaches we hope to decorate Dunedin with a very clear message:

OMV: Keep Out of the Great South Basin

Please email oilfreeotago@gmail.com if you can help in any way. If you would like to donate to the campaign to kick OMV OUT of the GSB, please make a regular donation if you can. No matter how small,  a regular donation will help us build up people power to stop OMV in their tracks.

OIL FREE OTAGO

38-9015-0104292-00

New to activism? Here’s a tip: if you’re a parent, you have exactly what it takes to become a climate activist: patience, endurance, dogged determination, good deduction skills and the ability to keep one step ahead of your opponent! Humour! If you’re not a parent then you’ve been a kid and will have all of those skills too, plus a youthful energy that can never be underestimated. ♥

Also coming up:

Friday 10 May 7pm – Film: Reluctant Radical at Knox Church 449 George St, Dunedin

Saturday 11 May 10am – Go Fossil Free Bank Challenge at the Dunedin Railway Station

Saturday 18 May 9:30am – Hands Across the Sand at St Clair Esplanade

Let’s end with the words of Mayor Cull in 2017: “The world is waking up. We can’t identify benefits of exploring for oil off our coast. We don’t have any kind of right to trade in our grandkids’ futures for a few pieces of silver now.”

 

Austrian oil giant OMV last week (10 April 2019) announced plans to drill for oil and gas in the Great South Basin (GSB) as early as this year. OMV took over Shell’s GSB drilling permit and last year were given extra time by this government to decide whether or not to proceed with deep water exploratory drilling in the southern ocean.

Last week, on the one year anniversary of the Ardern government’s ban on new offshore oil and gas permits, they signalled they will go ahead.

“OMV’s decision blatantly disregards Jacinda Ardern’s call for climate change to be her generation’s nuclear free moment. It is a slap in the face to the millions of young people around the world striking for urgent action on climate change, including more than a thousand school students here in Dunedin.” Oil Free Otago’s Rosemary Penwarden said.

“OMV may not yet understand how much we care about our ocean, our sea creatures and birds, and our southern way of life. They may not know the proud history of peaceful civil disobedience in Aotearoa NZ. They may not know that our city’s leaders have opposed deep sea drilling, divested our ratepayers’ money from fossil fuel investments and are already on the way to a fossil free future.

“One year ago, we wrote to OMV and told them not to come. They need reminding.”

Last year’s IPCC report makes it clear. The world’s economies must massively and swiftly reduce our use of coal, oil and gas to prevent the worst effects of climate change. Most of the fossil fuels already found cannot be burned if we are to have a hope of preserving a liveable climate.

“And yet OMV plan to explore for more unburnable oil and gas for short term profit at the expense of all of our futures. That is inexcusable.” Ms Penwarden said.

“OMV is one of 100 oil giants responsible for 71% of global emissions. Instead of looking for more unburnable oil and gas OMV and the others should be putting their billions into renewable energy and infrastructure projects needed in the face of climate disruption, rising oceans and more ferocious storms, floods and droughts. They should put their money where the future is.

“OMV should surrender their drilling permits and leave Aotearoa. If they continue they should expect resistance every step of the way.”

….

Join the resistance! email us at oilfreeotago@gmail.com

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