Biological diversity, or biodiversity, refers to the variety of life on Earth. As defined by the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity, it includes diversity of ecosystems, species and genes and the ecological processes that support them. Natural diversity in ecosystems provides essential economic benefits and services to human society—such as food, clothing, shelter, fuel and medicines—as well as ecological, recreational, cultural and aesthetic values, and thus plays an important role in sustainable development. Biodiversity is under threat in many areas of the world. Maintaining global biodiversity has emerged as a prominent and widespread public issue.
We recognize the importance of biodiversity conservation and support it through our values, performance, communication and engagement.
Values: Protecting the safety and health of people and the environment is a Chevron core value. Therefore, we:
- Strive to design our facilities and conduct our operations to avoid adverse impacts to human health and to operate in an environmentally sound, reliable and efficient manner.
- Conduct our operations responsibly in all areas, which includes environments with sensitive biological characteristics.
Performance: We strive to avoid and minimize any significant impacts our projects and operations may have on sensitive species, habitats and ecosystems. This means that we:
- Integrate biodiversity into our business decision-making and management through our Operational Excellence Management System (OEMS).
- Drive and assess our performance relating to biodiversity through key OEMS expectations and processes, including Environmental Stewardship; Environmental, Social and Health Impact Assessment; Risk Management; and Health, Environment and Safety Property Transfer.
- Understand that humans and the natural environment are interdependent and interact with each other in various ways. In managing our impacts, we consider those interrelationships and the functions that ecosystems perform in supporting sustainable economic development.
- Recognize that our activities could affect particularly sensitive and valuable biodiversity inside and outside legally designated protected areas. Therefore, we:
- Decide whether and how to operate in a protected or sensitive area, based on consideration of the specific circumstances of the area and operation involved.
- Operate in such areas only with government legal authorization and where we are confident we can comply with all regulatory requirements and use operating practices appropriately protective of the area.
- Use our OEMS processes to avoid or minimize potential risks of our operations to sensitive biological resources and seek ways to make positive contributions to biodiversity conservation in the area.
Communication and Engagement: We undertake activities to raise internal and external awareness of the importance of conserving biodiversity and ways the company is addressing it. These include:
- Communicating about our biodiversity-related activities to employees and outside audiences, for example, through our Corporate Responsibility Report.
- Engaging with government, local communities and others to understand and work to address significant biodiversity issues in areas where we operate.
- Participating in industry associations and other forums to share and promote best practices for biodiversity conservation.
- Seeking to understand and, where appropriate, participating in development of external policy-making activities that affect our operations, such as those adopted under the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity and national, regional and local biodiversity policies and plans.
- Working with a variety of external organizations to make positive contributions to biodiversity conservation in areas where we operate and globally.
Chevron's management of the oil field on Barrow Island, off the northwest coast of Australia, is recognized as an industry benchmark for the coexistence of petroleum development and biodiversity protection. Since operations began in 1964, Chevron has implemented measures designed to prevent the introduction of invasive mammal species and the spread of weeds on this Class A nature reserve.
Chevron's Salak Operation, among the largest geothermal energy fields in the world, is located in one of Indonesia's largest national parks. We're working with park rangers, local farmers and international wildlife groups to protect the park's biodiversity while producing the energy that powers Indonesia's progress.
Chevron supports the Lekki Conservation Center in Lagos, Nigeria, as part of our effort to preserve nature wherever we operate. Across the street from Chevron's Lagos offices, the urban nature preserve is the only facility of its kind in the Lekki Peninsula. Its 193 acres (78 hectares) of swampland and savannah are home to monkeys, reptiles and birds.