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Nine fossil fuel companies from the United States and Europe have collectively paid $15.8 billion to Russia in various types of taxes and duties since the annexation of Crimea in 2014, a group of non-governmental organizations said Thursday. .
The groups Global Witness, Greenpeace USA and Oil Change International used data from independent Oslo energy research firm Rystad Energy to calculate how much money North American and European oil and gas companies have sent to Russia.
The groups considered only companies with exploration and production operations in Russia.
The data was shared amid criticism that the West's acquisitions of Russian coal, oil and gas, which are mainly state-owned assets, have helped finance Russia's war in Ukraine.
These payments underscore how much capital has been transferred to Russia by Western energy companies that chose to continue operating in Russia after Crimea was annexed.
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The groups examined royalties, export duties, premiums, taxes and tariffs, as well as "government benefit oil," which includes the value of actual oil that companies may have delivered to Russia to arrive at the figure. of $15.8 billion.
The groups compiled a list of the nine companies in these regions that had paid the most money.
All those payments were legal, and other multinational companies outside the energy sector have also made similar payments to the Russian state.
UK-based Shell sent $7.85 billion, the most of the listed companies, the groups said in a statement, first shared with CNN.
It was followed by the American ExxonMobil with US$ 2,810 million.
Two German-registered companies, Wintershall and Wintershall DEA, now merged, paid a combined $2.86 billion.
BP, the British multinational oil and gas company, paid $817 million, according to Rystad data.
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The three groups that compiled the data said that while the $15.8 billion figure is significant, the identified companies are also responsible for tens of billions of dollars more flowing to the Russian state because of their holdings in Russian oil and gas companies.
For example, BP had until recently a 19.75% stake in the Russian energy company Rosneft.
Rosneft paid $353.16 billion to Russia in taxes, fees, royalties and oil revenues between 2014 and 2021, according to Rystad data.
Although BP may not have paid that money directly to Russia, Murray Worthy, gas campaign lead at Global Witness, said it still had some responsibility for the payments.
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"The true amount these companies are responsible for paying Russia is much closer to the $100bn mark, but is obscured by their holdings in Russian companies. We believe that BP alone is responsible for $78.4bn that go to the government of Russia through the stake in oil and gas giant Rosneft that it claims to have had until a few weeks ago," he told CNN.
He was referring to payments during the period between Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the end of 2021.
In a statement, he added: "The Russian energy industry is Putin's biggest source of income and companies like BP that (continued to do business with Russia despite)... the invasion of Crimea, continuing to support the money coming in." to their war fund, they should certainly question whether they now have Ukrainian blood on their hands.
BP announced it would give up that stake just days after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Several other fossil fuel companies have since followed suit.
In an email to CNN, BP spokesman David Nicholas said the company did not recognize the $78.4 billion figure, explaining that the only money BP paid directly to the Russian state was $350 million in taxes during the six years between 2015 and 2020. The spokesman was unable to provide data for the entire eight-year period.
"On February 27, we announced that we will exit our stake in Rosneft, that the two BP-appointed directors resign from its management board effective immediately, and that we will exit our other business in Russia with Rosneft," Nicholas said.
BP now faces a potential $25 billion loss related to its exit.
Worthy said that while BP could deny responsibility for Rosneft's payments to the Russian state, "it has always been more than happy to benefit from the billions that have come from its involvement with the company."
Although the data set focused on payments made primarily through taxes and tariffs, much more money flows from the West into Russia's coffers in the form of actual purchases of oil and gas, used for everything from gas for heating homes to fuel for vehicles.
The true amount of money going from oil and gas companies in the West to the Russian state would be far greater than any amount paid in taxes and tariffs.
"So when Rosneft sells its products for export, those sales transactions are how it makes most of its money," said Alexandra Gillies, adviser to the Natural Resources Governance Institute (NRGI). English), which focuses on resource-rich countries achieving sustainability.
According to an NRGI database, Rosneft transferred $58.6 billion to the Russian state in 2019 alone, the last year before the pandemic.
Gillies said that while the Western companies that decided to leave Russia were a step in the right direction, it should have come much sooner.
"It took this invasion of Ukraine for Western oil companies to say, 'You know what? We don't want to continue to allow what this regime is doing.' They should have made that decision much sooner with the invasion of Crimea, or with the repressive nature of the Putin regime, or the Putin regime's interference in US elections, or the poisoning of opposition figures, including on British soil," Gillies said.
"There were so many moments in the last few years that should have prompted Western companies to divest themselves of their cooperation with the regime."
The other four companies that appear in the NGO statement are the French TotalEnergies (US$ 568 million);
Norway's Equinor (US$455 million);
the Austrian OMV (US$ 246 million) and the Swiss Trafigura (US$ 202 million).
Rystad told CNN that his data was based on estimates derived from the few available tax reports.
TotalEnergies also has stakes in Russian oil and gas companies that have paid hundreds of millions of dollars more to the government, according to Rystad data.
CNN has contacted all of the companies named, as well as Rosneft, for comment.
ExxonMobil did not respond to CNN's request.
Shell did not comment to CNN on the amount of money paid, referring to a recent press release in which the company announced it would withdraw its involvement in all activities related to Russian fossil fuels "gradually" and stop buying Russian crude.
Shell CEO Ben van Beurden also apologized in the statement after the company came under fire for buying a cargo of Russian crude in early March while other companies and traders shunned the product following the Russian invasion in February.
TotalEnergies announced on Tuesday that it would stop buying Russian oil at the end of the year, but would continue to buy Russian gas.
The company did not respond to CNN's request for comment.
Equinor closed its operations in Russia and says it has stopped trading Russian oil.
Its spokesman, Ola Morten Aanestad, did not confirm the $455 million figure in an email to CNN, saying "it is too early to be specific on the exit process" when asked if the company would stay out. of Russia permanently.
An OMV spokesman would not comment on the amount of money it had transferred to Russia when asked by CNN, pointing to a recent statement in which the company said it was "reassessing its involvement in Russia."
Wintershall DEA told CNN that the company "was not in a position to verify the figures presented to us" and that it "always conducted its business in compliance with all applicable laws."
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A Trafigura spokesman said the company did not pay anything to the Russian government "derived from fossil fuel production."
The company has a 10% stake in the Vostok Oil project, of which Rosneft is the majority shareholder.
The spokesman said that "no other money has been paid" since the acquisition of the stake in 2020. "Trafigura has not received any dividend or similar payment from its stake in Vostok Oil."
Lorne Stockman, co-director of research at Oil Change International, said the world must now avoid looking to other autocratic regimes to substitute for fossil fuels from Russia.
"Fossil fuels are the currency of despots, dictators and warmongers. Our global reliance on oil and gas is not only killing our planet, it is also making the world a less safe and equal place. Big Polluters Westerners like BP and Shell have been working for more than a century in countries with appalling human rights records," Stockman said.
"Now is the time to end the era of fossil fuels."
War in UkraineOil