{"id":2152,"date":"2025-06-09T21:10:34","date_gmt":"2025-06-09T20:10:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=2152"},"modified":"2025-06-12T10:37:52","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T09:37:52","slug":"the-oil-and-gas-men","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/?p=2152","title":{"rendered":"The Oil and Gas Man"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Lord Browne is an inappropriate choice for the Chancellorship of Cambridge University for four reasons:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. The 2005 Texas City explosion killed 15 workers and injured 180. The U.S. Chemical Board’s Final Report<\/a> blamed \u201ca culture of cost-cutting<\/em>\u201d that took place under Browne\u2019s tenure as Chief Executive of BP. “BP targeted budget cuts of 25 percent in 1999 and another 25 percent in 2005, even though much of the refinery\u2019s infrastructure and process equipment were in disrepair<\/em>.” Though not CEO during the 2010 Deepwater disaster, Browne’s cost-cutting leadership helped create the conditions that led to it. 

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  2. In the early 2000s, Browne rebranded BP as \u201cBeyond Petroleum<\/em>\u201d, presenting it as environmentally progressive. This campaign became a notorious example of greenwashing\u2014as BP kept investing heavily in oil and gas with minimal renewable energy spending. Browne\u2019s own personal commitment to fighting climate change is undermined by his lifestyle, such as abundant use of private jets <\/a>for pleasure. “And I wanted to be able to do it quickly because time was of the essence, so I\u2019ve used it a lot to fly to my other house which is in Venice, Italy … So I used it to travel around Europe both on my private business and on my vacations and I like it very much<\/em>.”

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  3. He launched BP\u2019s partnership with Russian oligarchs and the Russian state through TKK-BP, meeting President Putin several times. Browne praised Putin for bringing stability to Russia, whilst ignoring the curtailment of civil liberties, political freedoms and press freedom. Putin was \u201cthe new broom who would sweep everything out, the big reformer<\/em>“, or “the reformer who was going to open up Russia and be good for security”<\/em>. Browne did not publicly criticise Putin\u2019s anti-gay legislation. From 2015 to 2021, Browne was chairman of L1\u202fEnergy. This is the energy arm of LetterOne, controlled by the oligarch Mikhail Fridman,<\/a> who is now subject to sanctions following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

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  4. While extending every sympathy with Browne\u2019s personal dilemma leading to his resignation in 2007 as BP\u2019s Chief Executive, he was nonetheless found to have been dishonest in court. Judge Eady stated, \u201cI regret to say that I have concluded that he told a deliberate lie to the court,<\/em>\u201d and noted Browne\u2019s \u201cimproper<\/em>\u201d behaviour was \u201cserious and relevant to his <\/em>credibilit<\/i>y”. The judge went on: \u201cI am not prepared to make allowances for a \u2018white lie\u2019 told to the court in circumstances such as these \u2013 especially by a man who prays in aid his reputation and distinction and refers to the various honours he has received under the present government when asking the court to prefer his account<\/em>“. The full legal judgment is here<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    The possible election of Lord Browne to the Chancellorship raises concerns about risk of damage to the reputation of the University of Cambridge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    (This article was written by Professor Wyn Evans, who is also a candidate for the Chancellorship<\/em>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    Lord Browne is an inappropriate choice for the Chancellorship of Cambridge University for four reasons: The possible election of Lord Browne to the Chancellorship raises concerns about risk of damage to the reputation of the University of Cambridge. (This article was written by Professor Wyn Evans, who is also a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2152"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2152\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2174,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2152\/revisions\/2174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/21percent.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}