Integrating Biodiversity Conservation into Oil and Gas ... - EBI

7. BENEFITING BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION
How can companies go beyond minimizing impacts and take actions that benefit biodiversity?
For companies operating in areas with high biodiversity
values, integrating biodiversity considerations into
decision-making is no longer just about mitigating the
negative impacts of their presence. Acting on increased
public pressure and their own sense of corporate
responsibility, some companies are going beyond
mitigation to take advantage of opportunities to benefit
biodiversity conservation. Such action can be particularly
important in countries where capacity and resources for
protecting the environment are limited.
Opportunities for benefiting biodiversity are actions
that allow a company to contribute to improving the
status of biodiversity and the capacity to conserve it, at
a local, regional or national level. Companies may find
that pursuing efforts to improve the state of biodiversity
conservation in an area will deliver tangible business
value as well, including links to corporate social
responsibility. Such activities go beyond offsets, which
are intended to reduce or compensate for the negative
“Our conclusion is that we can have a real,
measurable and positive impact on the
biodiversity of the world. ”
– The Lord Browne of Madingley, FREng
Group Chief Executive, BP
impacts of a project, to ensure no net loss of biodiversity
(see Box 17).
Companies can make investments in biodiversity
conservation at both a project level and a company
level. At the project level, such activities will be
strongly driven by the results of a project ESIA and any
determined need for actions beyond mitigation. At the
company level, opportunities to benefit biodiversity
conservation can be a key part of an overall corporate
BOX 17. OFFSETS VS. OPPORTUNITIES
Opportunities to benefit biodiversity should be seen as measures to complement, rather than replace, any voluntary or
required investment in conservation offsets. An offset is typically a measure taken to reduce the negative impacts of a
project, both primary and secondary, and to help achieve no net loss of biodiversity at a project site. The objective of an
offset is that, by the end of a project, the status of biodiversity in a particular area is comparatively as well off overall as
before the project began. Use of offsets for this purpose should be the minimum expected standard by which all companies
operate. While legal requirements for offsets and compensation vary from country to country, some sites require
companies to implement offset and compensation measures if impacts occur. Offset or compensation measures might
include placing property into protected status, buying land for new protected areas, enhancing or restoring degraded land
or supporting research or capacity-building for protected areas management.
In 1994 Statoil began construction on the Europipe natural gas pipeline, which begins in the North Sea off of Norway
and comes ashore in Germany’s Lower Saxony Waddensea National Park. Finding an acceptable landfall for the pipeline
to come ashore in the park was a major challenge. After a lengthy planning process and consideration of ten possible
landfalls, a route that includes a tunnel under the tidal flats was chosen for crossing the park. The route was expected to
have temporary, but still significant, impacts on the environment. To offset the effects, Statoil, in keeping with German
law, constructed a 42-acre (17-hectare) biotope with ponds and sand dunes close to the pipeline metering station, on land
that was previously an extensively used agricultural field with a relatively poor flora and fauna. The area, which has since
received official protected status, is now a habitat for a number of rare and threatened species.
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Integrating Biodiversity Conservation into Oil and Gas Development