The California Connection to the Oil Pipeline Rupture in Ecuador

The Ecuadorian Amazon is one of the most bio-culturally diverse places in the whole of Amazonia and on the planet. The vast horizons of rainforest teeming with life are stewarded by more than half a million Indigenous peoples from more than twenty nationalities (including communities living in voluntary isolation). It is a true global treasure, and it is facing immense threats. 

The latest pipeline rupture in the Ecuadorian Amazon, as reported by NBC News and Democracy Now, continues to remind us why the Amazon is the last place in the world that oil drilling should be expanding. 

The footage from the spill posted by the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) on Friday shows oil spraying out of the pipeline, a vivid and terrible reminder of what Indigenous and local communities have been facing for decades. This is especially troubling given the fact that the Western Amazon is where fossil fuel expansion for export markets is accelerating. Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso plans to open up millions of acres of intact roadies forests later this year in order to double oil production to pay off debt to China.

As we recently published in our Linked Fates report, 66% of the oil exported from the Amazon goes to the United States – with the majority going to California. In fact, nearly 50% of all oil exported from the Amazon going to California – with Ecuador even surpassing Saudi Arabia as the largest foreign source of crude oil. This equates to an average of about 1 in every 9 gallons pumped in the state coming from the Amazon rainforest. In Southern California – it’s 1 in 7 gallons. This kind of flies in the face of the state’s progressive reputation and policy leadership. 

Government negligence has contributed to oil spills like this recent rupture and the two that occurred in 2020 and impacted hundreds of thousand of Indigenous peoples in Ecuador and will likely also be an ongoing issue. The human rights violations of oil and extractive industries operating in the region is affecting millions of Indigenous peoples in the Amazon basin whose cultural survival depends on intact forests and rivers. 

“This is the exact reason why we oppose oil extraction,” said Andres Tapia of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon (CONFENIAE), in the NBC story. “Spills have become a part of our daily life, and we live with the contamination for decades. The oil industry has only brought us death and destruction.  … We are calling on the government to halt oil expansion plans and properly clean up this spill and all the others that continue to contaminate our territories and violate our rights.” 

Nemo Andi Guiquita, a leader of the Waorani tribe, told NBC News, “We should be fighting to protect our rainforest in Ecuador, but instead they are granting more oil concessions.” On Saturday, Guiquita said, “The oil spill has reached the banks of the Coca River. The situation is critical because more than 60,000 people depend on water from this river.”

California has already taken important leadership in starting the process of winding down production of oil, but it is the volume of oil refined in state that continues to create pressure for production expansion in Ecuador and continued production in California. That volume of refining must be reduced. Given California’s connection to oil drilling and expansion plans in the Amazon, Governor Gavin Newsom and other state leaders have a legacy opportunity to take concrete steps to advance solutions. California businesses and citizens that are maximizing public transit and converting to electric vehicles are also a key part of the solution. 

Join this pledge of solidarity and stay tuned for more ways to engage as new dimensions of our work take shape in California in 2022.