The Wreckers of the Earth: London company directory

by Corporate Watch / Arms Trade, Banking & Finance, Companies, Construction, Environment, Food & Agriculture, Media & PR, News, Slider / 20 Feb 2020

OCTOBER 2021 NOTE: This version of the directory is now out of date. For an updated version, see here

Our new “Wreckers of the Earth” map of London identifies planet-killing companies based in the city, giving their addresses and short descriptions. This directory, accompanying the map, presents all the company information in one document. It also features sector introductions which explain a bit more about the roles these companies play.

London is one of the main global hubs of ecocidal capitalism. London is home to fossil fuel giants and to many of the worst mining polluters. It is the world’s second largest financial centre (after New York). It is the key financial marketplace for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and for trading oil, metals, minerals and other “commodities” sucked out of the earth. Lax regulation and tight security make London a money-laundering haven for the world’s tyrants, oligarchs, and billionaires. The legacy of the British empire still lives in the infrastructure and services London offers: insurance markets, law firms, arms dealers, PR agencies, down to prestige shopping and investment property.

To break things down, we identify three main categories of wreckers in this directory:

Primary planet-killers: companies on the “front lines” of ecological devastation. Oil, coal and gas companies, mining giants, agribusiness empires, plastics or cement producers, and other major polluters.
The facilitators: the banks, investment funds, insurers, law firms and security companies who provide the supply lines and services without which the “front line” companies couldn’t function.
Ideology industry: the institutions promoting and normalising environmental destruction, runaway growth, and the profit motive. Including media, academic units, think tanks, lobbyists, PR firms, and the new boom industry of specialist “greenwashing” initiatives.

Our list is not comprehensive – there are more London-based companies working in these industries than we include here. We have prioritised those with the biggest global scale, plus others we think are worth highlighting in certain areas.

NB: this information was compiled and checked in February 2020.

1. Primary planet-killers

1.1 Hydrocarbon majors

1.1.1 The national oil companies

1.1.2 The multinational “oil majors”

1.2 Hydrocarbons: smaller oil companies, frackers and UCG

1.2.1 Smaller “conventional” oil and gas companies

1.2.2 The frackers: “unconventional fossil fuels” specialists

1.3 Oil and gas services and shipping

1.3.1 Oilfield services

1.3.2 Liquefied Natural Gas

1.3.3 Oil shipping and gas pipelines

1.4 Non-fossil energy: nuclear, biomass, dams …

1.4.1 Nuclear

1.4.2 Biomass

1.4.3 Dams: hydropower companies

1.5 Mining: metals and minerals

1.6 Earth-killing infrastructure: engineering and construction

1.6.1 Energy conglomerates

1.6.2 International engineering and construction giants

1.6.3 UK big builders

1.6.4 Cement producers

1.7 Agribusiness

1.8 Plastics and other chemical polluters

2. The facilitators

2.1 Banks

2.1.1 China’s Big Four

2.1.2 Top 20 multinational investment banks

2.1.3 Multilateral development banks

2.1.4 Smaller specialist banks

2.2 Investment funds

2.2.1 Top 20 Institutional Investors

2.2.2 Sovereign Wealth Funds

2.2.3 Private Equity

2.2.4 Hedge Funds

2.2.5 Smaller earth-wrecking specialist investors

2.3 Insurance companies

2.4 Other finance sector institutions

2.4.1 Auditors: the Big 4 accountancy firms

2.4.2 The Rating Agencies

2.4.3 Exchanges

2.5 Law firms

2.6 Military and security

2.6.1. Arms manufacturers

2.6.2 PSMCs (Mercenaries and security firms)

2.7 Government

3. Ideology industry

3.1 Universities

3.2 Media

3.2.1 Social media platforms

3.2.2 TV and radio

3.2.3 Newspapers (and news websites)

3.3 Trade associations and Lobby groups

3.5 Think tanks

3.6 PR firms

3.7 Greenwashing services

“The earth is not dying, it is being killed, and those who are killing it have names and addresses.” Utah Phillips

Capitalism is burning up our planet, devastating ecosystems and communities in its ceaseless hunger for profit. Everything is for sale, and the one great goal is growth: producing and consuming ever more stuff, even as it kills us. This engine of mass destruction is driven by burning forests: the long-dead forests of fossil fuels, and the living forests of today.

Though we all play our parts in the consumer system, some people play much bigger parts than others. The people killing the earth are those directing the machine – and crushing any resistance to it.

Our “Wreckers of the Earth” project has two aims: to identify the main planet-killers based in London; and to show how they work together as a coordinated system of power and profit.

This project builds on the work of a number of other people and groups, highlighted in the text, and we hope it will encourage future work by others. Future work by us will investigate the links, from investment to ideas, that connect these together.

We have chosen to focus on London because it is the UK home for the most multinational companies, their financiers and other backers. Plus we don’t have the capacity to do the same exercise for the whole of the UK right now. But if you would like to do something similar for another city or town and want to hear about how we’ve put this together, get in touch.

Here we only identify the companies. Lots more could be done to investigate them further: to find out more about their business, key contracts or operations, which individuals are making the decisions, who is profiting, and so on. If you’re interested in this, have a look at our ‘Do-It-Yourself’ handbook, and sign up to news update emails to hear about the trainings we run.

1. Primary planet-killers

1.1 Hydrocarbon majors

The companies in this section provide the fuel that is burning the planet. “Big oil” includes the massive state-backed extractive industries of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Russia, China, and the other major oil-soaked states. And alongside them the multinational “supermajors” – private corporations including BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Conoco Philips, Total, and Eni. Between them these companies are responsible for the supply end of much of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

London is a major centre for big oil and gas. BP is headquartered here. Shell is incorporated in London, and runs many of its operations from here. Most of the other major firms have London offices. Even those without London locations have connections to London-based finance, insurance and other companies (listed in Part 2).

The descriptions below give very brief glimpses into their impact on the world. The companies in this section cause oil spills and other pollution disasters, instigate wars and massacres, bankroll authoritarian regimes, suppress revolutions and popular movements, destroy indigenous communities, disrupt ecosystems and wildlife habitats on a massive scale. Their publicly recorded trails of destruction already fill volumes – but many more of their activities may never come to light, thanks to the enormous power and violence they wield.

Some useful sources and further information: Platform “Carbon Web” mapping of BP and Shell connections; Environmental Justice Atlas (EJA); Exxon Secrets (NB: Exxon’s UK base is outside London). For some more in-depth reading see: Burning Up – A Global History of Fossil Fuel Consumption, by Simon Pirani. We have referred to the CDB’s “Carbon Majors database ” report listing major carbon emitters in the list below – this shouldn’t be taken to fully endorse their methodology, but it gives a useful glimpse of the scale of the problem.

Note: what about coal? This section doesn’t include the other big group of hydrocarbon planet-killers – the coal companies. Some multinationals involved in coal mining – notably, Glencore and RWE – are listed in the mining section below. However, the world’s very biggest coal producers are largely state-owned corporations – notably the massive Coal India Ltd, and the various Chinese coal companies – which do not have a presence in London. The world’s biggest private sector coal miner, US corporation Peabody Energy, has a “London” office that is actually in Guildford. On the other hand, many financiers of the coal industry are here: these are listed in Part 2.

1.1.1 The national oil companies

The world’s biggest oil and gas drillers are state-owned corporations run by the main fossil fuel producing nations. At the top of the list are the giants controlling the gulf oil fields of Saudi Arabia and Iran, and Russia’s vast gas reserves.

Saudi Aramco

Aramco Overseas Company: 10 Portman Square, Marylebone, London, W1H 6AZ

Source: https://europe.aramco.com/en/info/contact-us

Saudi Arabia’s national oil company. It is the world’s biggest single greenhouse gas emitter – responsible for 4.5% of all the world’s carbon emissions between 1988 and 2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. A minority of its shares were recently listed on the country’s local stock exchange but it remains majority owned by the tyrannical Saudi state.

Owners: majority owned by Saudi Arabia. A minority of shares are traded on the Saudi stock exchange.

Gazprom

20 Triton Street, London, NW1 3BF

Source: http://www.gazprom-mt.com/HowToFindUs/Pages/default.aspx

Massive Russian gas company, the world’s biggest natural gas producer. Responsible for an estimated 3.9% of all global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Gazprom is a leading player in drilling new oil and gas fields opened by retreating ice in the Arctic.

Ownership: majority owned by Russian government. A minority of shares are traded on the London, Frankfurt and Moscow stock exchanges. Shareholders include BlackRock, Vanguard, and the other big investment funds profiled below in Part 2.

National Iranian Oil Company

NIOC House, 6th Floor, 4 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0NE

Source: http://www.iocukltd.co.uk/contact.php

Iran controls the world’s second biggest oil fields after Saudi Arabia. These contributed 2.28% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. In 2018 the collision of an Iranian oil tanker in the East China Sea was one of the worst oil shipping disasters in decades, killing all 32 crew members and causing three huge oil spills.

Ownership: Iranian government. Iran’s oil was formerly owned by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, the ancestor of today’s BP, before nationalisation in 1954.

China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC)

5 Wilton Road, London, SW1V 1AN

Source: http://chinachamber.org.uk/index.php/en/member-list/403-petrochina-international-london-co-ltd

CNPC is the Chinese state oil company, responsible for 1.56% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Its 2010 Dalian oil spill caused an oil slick stretching over at least 183 square kilometres off North East China.

Owners: the government of China. CNPC also has a publicly listed susidiary, called Petro China, whose shareholders are a mixture of Chinese banks and funds, along with the big global investment funds profiled below in Part 2.

Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA)

7 Old Park Lane, London, W1K 1QR

Source: http://www.pdvsa.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=6581&Itemid=898&lang=en

Venezuelan state-owned oil and natural gas company, responsible for 1.23% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Venezuela is the fifth largest oil exporting country in the world. Severe safety concerns have been raised about PDVSA’s working practices, in particular after a 2012 refinery explosion left 42 people dead and destroyed 1,600 homes. After Canada, Venezuela is the world’s leading producer of tar sands oil, as developing technology allows exploitation of the vast “extra heavy crude” deposits in the Orinoco Basin.

Kuwait Petroleum Corp

KPC House, 54 Pall Mall, London, SW1J 5JH

Source: https://www.kpc.com.kw/Pages/European-Regional-Office.aspx

Kuwait’s state-owned national oil company. Responsible for 1% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. The company has plans to increase oil production by 7.3% between 2018-30.

Sonatrach

Sonatrach Gas Marketing: 1^st and 2^nd floors, Panton House, London, 25 Haymarket, SW1Y 4EN

Source: https://www.sonatrach-uk.com/contact-us/

National state-owned oil company of Algeria. It is the largest company in Africa and is planning overseas expansion. Responsible for 1% of global carbon emissions 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. In July 2019, the company suffered its worst accident in 15 years when a huge liquefied natural gas complex exploded.

Petrobras

1 Angel Court, London, EC2R 7HJ

Source: http://www.petrobras.com.br/en/petrobras-worldwide/

Brazil’s national oil company. Responsible for 0.77% of emissions between 1988–2015 according to Carbon Majors Database. Responsible for a long list of oil spills, and mired in long-running corruption scandals.

Owners: Over 40% state owned. Other shares are traded on the Sao Paulo and New York exchanges, and held by Brazilian and global investment funds.

Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)

159 Hammersmith Road, London, W6 8BS

Source: https://www.nnpcgroup.com/CorporateServices/Pages/LondonOffice.aspx

The Nigerian government oil company. The Niger Delta basin is the site of Africa’s biggest oil and gas fields, which account for the majority of Nigeria’s export income. The Nigerian oil industry is run by joint ventures between NNPC and the “supermajor” multinationals – above all, Shell. In contrast to the wealth being sucked from the ground, the people of the Niger Delta live with massive environmental damage from oil spills and gas flaring, extreme poverty, and vicious repression in a zone militarised by the state and multinationals to protect oil profits.

Socar

2 St. James’s Market, London, SW1Y 4AH

Source: https://www.socartrading.com/contact

The state-owned petrochemical company of the oil and gas-rich central Asian state of Azerbaijan. Azeri gas is becoming a major geopolitical commodity as European governments build costly and environmentally devastating pipelines from the country to try and escape dependence on Russia’s Gazprom.

Rosneft

Rosneft Marine UK : Office 461, 1 Kingdom Street, Paddington Central, London, W2 6BD

Source: http://www.rosneftmarine.com/locations/

Russian oil giant, active worldwide but particularly in Siberia, the Arctic, and former Soviet territories around the Black Sea. Chairman of the board is former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.

Owners: 50% owned by the Russian government, the other 50% publicly traded. BP owns around 20% of the public shares, and QH Oil Investments – a Qatari state company – just under 19%.

1.1.2 The multinational “oil majors”

The “oil majors” (or even “supermajors”) is the name often given to the top flight of privately owned oil and gas multinationals. Most lists include the three big US-based firms – ExxonMobil, Conoco Philips, and Chevron; as well as Total from France, Britain’s BP, and the Anglo-Dutch company Shell. Eni, based in Italy, and Russia’s biggest privately-owned company Lukoil are also of a similar scale.

Despite their historic national affiliations, all these companies are largely owned by the same international investors – the likes of BlackRock, Vanguard, and the other massive investment funds we profile in Part 2 below.

Global HQ: 1 St James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4PD

Supply and Trading (IST) office: 20 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5NJ

Source:https://www.bp.com/en_gb/united-kingdom/home/where-we-operate/london.html; https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/what-we-do/bp-at-a-glance/key-business-addresses.html

Oil and gas multinational headquartered in London. Has a bloody history of colonial exploitation, environmental devastation and violence, from its foundations in the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company to the world’s largest oil spill, Deepwater Horizon in 2010. BP contributed 1.53% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. In recent years the company has cynically tried to rebrand itself as a “green” energy company developing renewable sources – while in reality its business remains overwhelmingly focused on fossil fuels. It plans to spend £41 bill i on on new oil exploration in the next decade including projects in the Canadian “tar sands”, the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, and the Amazon rainforest.

Royal Dutch Shell

Shell Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 7NA

Source: https://www.shell.co.uk/about-us/contact-us.html

British-Dutch multinational oil and gas company, headquartered in the Netherlands and incorporated in the United Kingdom. Accountable for 1.67% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Shell has no shortage of controversies; in particular it has been linked to the killing of the “Ogoni Nine”, including Ken Saro-Wiwa, as well as other horrific atrocities in the Niger Delta, where it is the main multinational oil exploiter. Shell, with Italian oil company Eni, is currently on trial in Italy over an alleged $1.3 billion bribery deal with a former Nigerian oil minister. In May 2016 an estimated 2,100 barrels of oil, nearly 90,000 gallons, spilled into the Gulf of Mexico – leaked from an undersea pipeline system operated off the Louisiana coast.

Owners: PLC listed on the London, Stock Exchange (LSE). The majority of shares are owned by the big investment funds profiled below in Part 2.

Chevron

1 Westferry Circus, Canary Wharf, London, E14 4HA

Source: https://group.canarywharf.com/office-occupier/chevron-uk/

US-based multinational oil company. Responsible for 1.3% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. And for a long list of oil spills, human rights atrocities, and much more. See the Environmental Justice Atlas for a map of social and environmental conflicts Chevron has a hand in.

Owners: PLC listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The majority of shares are owned by the big investment funds – the likes of BlackRock, Vanguard, and others profiled below in Part 2.

ConocoPhillips

20^th floor, 1 Angel Court, London, EC2R 7HJ

Source: https://www.conocophillips.co.uk/

American multinational energy corporation, created through the merger of Conoco and Phillips Petroleum Company in 2002. While maintaining a lower profile than other oil companies it has grown into the 3^rd largest US oil company and been responsible for 0.91% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Along with environmental degradation the company has a poor safety record in Texas, with more than two dozen workers killed in accidents and many others injured.

See also: “Co rporate rap sheet” onthe Corporate Research Project website.

Owners: US PLC, owned by major investment funds.

Total SA

10 Upper Bank Street, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5BF

Source: https://www.total.uk/contacts-gb

French multinational oil and gas company, one of the six biggest “supermajor” oil companies. Responsible for 0.95% of global carbon emissions in 1988-2015, according to Carbon Majors Database. Responsible for one of France’s worst environmental disasters, the 1999 sinking of the tanker Erika and the subsequent oil spill.

Owners: PLC, main shareholders are big global investment funds.

Eni

Eni House: 10 Ebury Bridge Road, London, SW1W 8PZ
Eni Trading & Shipping: 123 Buckingham Palace Road, London, SW1W 9SL

Source: https://www.eni.com/enipedia/en_IT/international-presence/europe/enis-activities-in-the-united-kingdom.page

Italian multinational oil and gas “supermajor”, active worldwide. It is the second main multinational, after Shell, involved in the Niger Delta – “one of the world’s most polluted regions”. Eni and Shell are currently on trial in Italy over an alleged $1.3 billion bribery deal with a former Nigerian oil minister. In an extremely rare case, the Eni CEO actually faces criminal charges.

Owners: 30% owned by the government of Italy. The remaining shares are publicly traded and owned by major global investors.

Lukoil

25 Canada Square, London, E14 5LB

Source: http://www.lukoil.com/InvestorAndShareholderCenter/Contacts

Russian oil and gas multinational headquartered in Moscow, and Russia’s second biggest company after Gazprom.

Owners: around 40% of shares are owned by its top managers. Other shares are traded on multiple stock exchanges, and owned by global investment funds.

NB important companies without a London location:

ExxonMobil is the other massive US-based oil company. It does not have a London office, but a base with some 600 employees nearby in Surrey: Ermyn House, Ermyn Way, Leatherhead, Surrey KT22 8UX.

Pemex (Mexican state oil company)

Peabody Energy (US oil and coal multinational)

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company

Iraq National Oil Company

1.2 Hydrocarbons: smaller oil companies, frackers and UCG

1.2.1 Smaller “conventional” oil and gas companies

Energean

3rd floor, Accurist House, 44 Baker Street, London, W1U 7AL

Source: https://www.energean.com/contact-us/

Greek-Israeli-UK oil and gas company racing to turn the Mediterrenean into an oil field. This company has grown fast in just a few years, thanks to capital injections from private equity investors and a warm relationship with the Israeli government. One of its projects is the first Israel-Cyprus gas pipeline. See our recent Corporate Watch profile.

Owners: major shareholders include “vulture fund” Third Point; oil-focused private equity fund Kerogen Capital; and Israel’s Bank Hapoalim, alongside the company’s founding partners. It also recently sold shares on the London, Stock Exchange, attracting the usual global investment funds such as BlackRock and Vanguard.

Neptune Energy

Nova North, 11 Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5BY

Source: https://www.neptuneenergy.com/contact-us/

British “independent” oil and gas company drilling in the North Sea, North Africa and Asia. Set up in 2015 with backing from private equity investors (see Part 2), it has since grown fast by buying up several other companies.

Owners: single biggest shareholder is China Investment Corporation (CIC), followed by a number of private equity investors.

Premier Oil PLC

23 Lower Belgrave Street, London, SW1W 0NR

Source: https://www.premier-oil.com/contact

Long-running British oil “independent” with licenses in the North Sea and Falkland Islands, as well as Mexico and more. A listed company and member of the FTSE 250 index.

Perenco

8 Hanover Square, London, W1S 1HQ

Source: https://www.perenco.com/contact

Anglo-French oil and gas company with headquarters in London and Paris, calling itself “the leading independent oil and gas company in Europe”. It has exploration and production activities in 16 countries around the globe, particularly in Africa but also in Turkey, Vietnam, Australia, South America, and the UK. Has been accused of human rights violations in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the ‘poorest oil city in the world’.

Tullow

9 Chiswick Park, 566 Chiswick High Road, London, W4 5XT

Source: https://www.tullowoil.com/contact

London based oil company, founded in Ireland but now calling itself “Africa’s leading independent oil company”, pursuing exploration licenses in multiple countries in West and East Africa. Supported by the UK government through its January 2020 “UK-Africa Investment Summit”,which focused heavily on UK companies exploiting African oil and gas.

Seplat Petroleum

4th Floor, 50 Pall Mall, London, SW1Y 5JH

Source: https://seplatpetroleum.com/contact/

Nigerian oil company focused on drilling in the Niger d elta – the scene of horrendous pollution from oil spills and gas flaring, extreme poverty, and vicious repression. Recently bought Eland Oil and Gas, another Nigerian-focused company.

Victoria Oil & Gas Plc

Scott House, Suite 1 The Concourse, Waterloo Station, London, SE1 7LY

Source: https://www.victoriaoilandgas.com/contact-us/

London based company that has gas drilling contracts, and a gas pipeline, in Cameroon. It is also exploring for gas in Russia.

1.2.2 The frackers: “unconventional fossil fuels” specialists

The economic growth machine drives seemingly endless demand for fossil fuel energy, depleting the sources of so-called “conventional” oil and gas supply. Luckily for the industry (if not the rest of us), new technologies help keep the motor going. They also create openings for newer companies specialising in fracking and other new extraction methods. For a deeper look at these issues, see our 2014 publication: To the Ends of the Earth: A Guide to Unconventional Fossil Fuels.

Following significant local campaigns and strategic direct action, the UK government has currently ordered a halt or “moratorium” on fracking in Britain. It very much continues elsewhere, with many of the same companies involved. Much of the information in this section comes from the excellent Frack Of f. See also their “list of bad guys”.

NB: not in the list:Ineos, one of the biggest UK players in this game, is listed below in the chemicals section (1.8). The infamous Cuadrilla Resources is based in Preston, Lancashire.

IGas Energy

7 Down Street, London, W1J 7AJ

Source: https://www.igasplc.com/contact

Operator of the largest number of onshore oil and gas fields in Britain. Frack Off identifies it as one of the key companies in the drive to fracking in the UK, with aims to extract Coal Bed Methane (CBM) and Shale Gas in England and Scotland. It began to drill the first shale well in Nottinghamshire in November 2018, which was initially delayed by an 80-hour blockade of the site entrance. See: Powerbase profile.

Owners: listed on the LSE AIM exchange. Its biggest investor is energy private equity investor Kerogen Capital.

Angus Energy PLC

Building 3, Chiswick Park, 566 Chiswick High Street, London, W4 5YA

Source: http://www.angusenergy.co.uk/contact/

Angus Energy is a onshore oil and gas company which owns and operates two conventional production fields in Brockham and Lidsey, Southern England. It has a 25% stake in the Balcombe oil field, along with Cuadrilla, and is the operator there. (See also: Frack Off.)

Major Shareholders: Knowe Properties Limited (8.2%); Rupert Labrum (7.21%); JDA Consulting Limited (5.4%); Jonathan Tidswell-Pretorius (4.9%).

Cluff Natural Resources plc

Third Floor, 5-8 The Sanctuary London, SW1P 3JS

Source: https://www.cluffnaturalresources.com/contact-us/

Has shares in a number of oil exploration licenses in the North Sea. Was one of the UK’s most visible companies pushing for U nderground C oal Gasification (UC G ) companies, although currently says it is focusing back on North Sea oil. Founded by multi-millionaire Algy Cluff who made his fortune in gold-mining in Africa and North Sea Oil. (See: Frack Off.)

Owners: PLC listed on the LSE AIM exchange. Major s hareholders: Canaccord (16.9%); IPGL (Michael Spencer) (16.8%); Lombard Odier (8.1%); Janus Henderson Investors (6.7%); Hargreaves Lansdown (5%); Fiske (4.5%); James Caird Asset Management (3.9%); SVM Asset Management (3%).

Europa Oil and Gas

6 Porter Street, London, W1U 6DD

Source: http://www.europaoil.com/contacts.aspx

Exploration and production company focused on very high impact exploration in the Atlantic off the coast of Ireland, supported by revenue from oil production in onshore UK. They hold two Underground Coal Gasification licenses around the Humber Estuary. (See: Frack Off.)

Listed on the LSE AIM exchange. Many of its ma in s hareholders’ identities are hidden behind nominee accounts.

Rathlin Energy

Suite 1, 3rd Floor, 11-12 St. James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4LB

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/06478035

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Rathlin Energy is exploring for oil and gas onshore in the East Riding of Yorkshire. As of August 2019 activity at its West Newton site was “suspended pending the analysis of the data acquired to date during the drilling and testing of the well”. (See also: Frack Off.)

UK Oil and Gas (UKOG)

The Broadgate Tower, 8th Floor, 20 Primrose Street, London, EC2A 2EW

Source: https://www.ukogplc.com/page.php?pID=7

British oil company mainly active onshore in the Weald Basin in southern England. It currently has eight licenses, including two now producing oil and others being explored or developed. Its subsidiaries include Horse Hill Developments, a company formed to drill on the Horse Hill wellsite where the company took out an injunction in 2018 to ban protests. (See also: Frack Off.)

Owners: UKOG is a PLC, listed on London’s AIM “alternative investment market” for smaller companies. Manyof its biggest investors’ identities are hidden behind nominee accounts.

1.3 Oil and gas services and shipping

When we think of the oil and gas industry, we tend to think of the headline-hitting companies listed above. These are the ones that bid for and operate “concessions” from governments to explore and drill for hydrocarbons. But behind them are a host of others, less well known but also indispensable, which work as specialist contractors and sub-contractors on different parts of the process.

In the industry jargon, hydrocarbon extraction is often divided into:

“upstream” – finding and drilling oil and gas;
“midstream” – transporting it, e.g., with tankers or pipelines;
“downstream” – refining it into finished products, such as petrol or plastics.

Some contractors work in just one of these areas, others cover a range of services. In this section we just give a few prominent examples. We also include a few of the big shipping companies that operate the major oil tanker fleets.

NB: notable companies without London locations: the UK has a thriving oil support industry, however many companies are based in and around the North Sea oil hub of Aberdeen rather than in London. This includes the UK HQs of: infamous US oil services and mercenary company Halliburton; big drilling contractor Transocean, involved in the Deepwater Horizon disaster; Abbot Group, Score Group, and many more.

1.3.1 Oilfield services

John Wood Group (Wood PLC)

23rd Floor, 25 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5LQ

Source: https://www.woodplc.com/our-locations

Formerly Amec Foster Wheeler (2017), Wood provides engineering, production and maintenance services to the energy industry globally, including Canada’s tar sands industry and companies such as BP, Exxon Mobil, GDF Suez, Shell and EDF.

Lloyd’s Register Group

71 Fenchurch Street, London, EC3M 4BS

Source: https://www.lr.org/en-us/contact-us/?region=GBR#office-locations

LR is a global engineering, business and technical services provider to the fossil fuel and energy industry. (NB not to be confused with Lloyds of London insurance, which features in Part 2 below.)

TechnipFMC

1 St. Paul’s Churchyard, London, EC4M 8AP

Source: https://www.technipfmc.com/en/where-we-operate/europe/united-kingdom

Major oil and gas services contractor, which provides everything from platforms to pipelines and refineries. Headquarters in London, Paris, and Texas. Has paid out over $500 million in various bribery cases involving Nigeria, Brazil, Equatorial Guinea and Ghana.

Owners: listed on Paris and New York exchanges. The French government has a small 4% holding.

Valaris PLC

110 Cannon Street, London, EC4N 6EU

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/07023598/filing-history

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Offshore oil drilling contractor based in London – the number one in the world by rigs managed (in 201 8). It runs oil rigs for Total, Saudi Aramco and many others. Formerly known as Ensco Rowan.

1.3.2 Liquefied Natural Gas

The booming Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) industry involves plants cooling gas into a liquid form that makes it easier for shipping. The industry lobby seeks to present gas as a “transition fuel” that is less polluting than coal or oil – an argument to keep on depleting hydrocarbon stocks and pumping out greenhouse gases because the economy is not “ready” to give up its fossil fuel addiction. In addition to carbon emissions, LNG is linked to hazardous methane leakage. See this report by Global Energy Monitor for more information.

Angola LNG

5 Hanover Square, London, W1S 1HE

Source: https://www.angolalng.com/en/contact-us/

The Angola LNG project is one of the largest ever single investments in the Angolan oil and gas industry. It is a partnership between Sonangol, Chevron, BP, Eni and Total to develop Liquefied Natural Gas.

Cheniere LNG

Berkeley Square House, Berkeley Square, London, W1J 6BY

Source: https://www.cheniere.com/contact-us/

International energy company which is the leading producer of Liquefied Natural Gas in the US.

Nigeria LNG

Heron House, 10 Dean Farrar Street, London, SW1H ODX

Source: http://www.nlng.com/Our-Company/Pages/Our-Locations.aspx

Main Nigerian liquefied natural gas-producing company with a plant on Bonny Island, Nigeria. It is owned by a consortium of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (49%) and several oil majors: Shell (25.6%), Total (15%) and ENI (10.4%).

1.3.3 Oil shipping and gas pipelines

Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC)

4 Thomas More Square, Thomas More Street, London, E1W 1YW

Source: https://www.msc.com/gbr/contact-us/msc-london?lang=en-gb

The Swiss-headquartered MSC is the world’s second-largest shipping line in terms of container vessel capacity.

Euronav

1st Floor, 99 Kings Road, London, SW3 4PA

Source: https://www.euronav.com/en/contact/

An Antwerp based company, listed on the New York stock exchange, which operates the world’s second biggest oil tanker fleet (after China’s COSCO, which has a UK base in Felixstowe).

Teekay Shipping

86 Jermyn St, London, SW1Y 6JD

Source: https://www.teekay.com/offices/europe/london/

One of the world’s biggest shipping companies, specialised in oil and liquefied gas tankers. Ranked as 8 ^th biggest oil tanker company by “Tanker Operator”.

Maran (MTM)

Manning House, 22 Carlisle Place, London, SW1P 1JA

Source: http://maranuk.co.uk/contact-us.html

One of the world’s top ten oil and liqu e fied gas tanker fleets, part of the empire of Greece’s biggest shipping owner John Angelicoussis.

Interconnector (Fluxys and Snam)

Interconnector (UK) Limited: 4th Floor, 10 Furnival Street, London, EC4A 1AB

Source: https://www.interconnector.com/

Interconnector is the company that operates the undersea gas pipeline between Belgium and the UK. It is owned 75/25 by two of Europe’s main gas infrastructure companies: Belgium’s Fluxys and Italy’s Snam. These are two of the four main companies identified by the European Network of Corporate Observatorie s (ENCO) as developing new gas pipeline infrastructure across Europe, including big environmentally destructive schemes piping gas across Southern and Eastern Europe; and also in lobbying heavily to entrench Europe’s reliance on gas. See: ENCO report and company profiles.

Owners: Fluxys is owned 75% by Publigas, a Belgian public sector inter-municipal holding company. The chairman is the former mayor of Ghent. Snam is a PLC with a major holding from the Italian state, other owners are large investment funds including BlackRock.

1.4 Non-fossil energy: nuclear, biomass, dams…

With pressure growing on the fossil fuel industry, many big energy companies are gradually – if much more slowly than their propaganda suggests – moving towards more “renewable” sources. But not all of these “green energy” solutions are by any means safe or environmentally harmless. Nuclear power, of course, is itself associated with tremendous ecological contamination. Hydropower, as practised by corporations seeking to maximise profits above all, often means mega-dam projects that displace human and other animal populations, divert water supplies, and devastate river-based ecologies. Another green-spun technology is biomass – which can include simply cutting and burning up forests before they even get the chance to turn into fossil fuels.

Some key sources and further information:

Biofuelwatch: UK biomass industry map
Corporate Watch: A-Z of Green Capitalism (2016)
Corporate Watch: Techno-fixes (2008)

1.4.1 Nuclear

Electricite de France (EDF)

EDF Trading (Global headquarters): 3rd Floor, Cardinal Place, 80 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 5JL

Source: www.edftrading.com/contact/our-offices

EDF is a French energy and electricity multinational. It is Europe’s largest nuclear power generator with 19 nuclear plants in France plus many more in the UK and across the world. It owns and runs all of the UK’s seven currently operating nuclear power plants. Its many other schemes include devastating dam projects that have met resistance from Brazil to Laos.

Vattenfall

1 Tudor St, London, EC4Y 0AH

Source: https://group.vattenfall.com/uk/who-we-are/contact-us

Swedish state-owned energy company which operates nuclear reactors in Sweden and Germany. Suing the German government over its decision to shut down nuclear plants following the Fukushima disaster. Also burns gas, coal, and biomass. Although its publicity focuses on wind and water, nuclear and fossil fuels remain its main energy sources.

Shareholders: Swedish government 100%

E.ON

E.ON Citigen CHP plant, 47-53 Charterhouse Street, London, EC1M 6PB

Source: ht tps://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:k6IWx-v385wJ:https://jobs.eon.com/uk/job/London-Business-Administrator/582664601/; http://interengineeringlgbt.com/event/site-tour-e-citigen-combined-heat-power/;

German energy company which is also one of the “Big Six” UK energy supply companies, and has been one of the main companies pushing for continued use of coal-fired power here. Its nuclear subsidiary PreussenElektra operates three nuclear power plants in Germany. E.ON is also a shareholder in Enerjisa, owner of the Tufanbeyli coal fired power station in Turkey.

NB: E.ON’s UK head office is in Coventry – the address above is the site of its “hidden power station” providing “combined heat and power” to the Barbican and offices in the City of London (more info here). It is also home for E.ON’s “national district heating control centre”.

Enel

Enel X, 360-364 City Road, London, EC1V 2PY

Source: https://evcharging.enelx.com/eu/support-eu/contact

Major Italian energy multinational. It owns stakes in nuclear power plants in Russia, France, Spain and Italy.

NB: This office belongs to its smaller UK business Enel X, which provides “energy solutions” to businesses and “smart city” technology projects.

See also: RWE, in the mining section

Not in London: Urenco (based in Stokes Poges); Horizon Nuclear Power (based in Gloucester)

1.4.2 Biomass

Drax Group

3rd Floor, Alder Castle, 10 Noble Street, London, EC2V 7JX

Source: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/ofgem-publications/142569

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/07/30/eco-activists-barricade-london-office-fossil-fuel-company-discover/

NB: this London address was confirmed as of July 1999 only. Drax’s registered address is at the Drax power station in Yorkshire.

Drax in North Yorkshire was the last big coal-fired power station built in the UK, completed in 1986, and privatised in the 1990s. As opinion turned against coal, Drax Group moved to burning wood – mostly shipped in from the forests of North America. According to Biofuelwatch, “Drax Power Station is the biggest burner of wood for electricity in the world and the UK’s single largest carbon emitter”. Drax is also now planning to convert its remaining coal-fired units to gas, and build additional new gas turbines, becoming “the biggest gas power station in Europe”. Drax has a busy corporate spin operation arguing that it can use Carbon, Capture and Storage (CCS) technology to become “carbon negative” by 2030. This includes its “Biofuel Energy CCS” (BECCS) technology, being developed with a company spun off by Leeds University’s School of Chemistry.

See also: dossier by Biofuelwatch on its #AxeDrax campaign.

Major s hareholders: Invesco Limited (14%); Schroders plc (10%); Merian Global Investors (5%); Orbis Holdings Limited (5%); Blackrock (5%)

Active Energy Group plc

27-28 Eastcastle Street, London, W1W 8DH

Source: https://www.aegplc.com/contacts/contact-details/

Pollutant forestry-to-fuel biomass company, which has started operations in North Carolina. It calls itself “London’s only listed, combined, international biomass and forestry management business”.

Major s hareholders: Gravendonck Private Foundation (18%); RG Spinks (4.5%); RM Derrickson (3%); InterTrade Ltd (3%).

AMP Clean Energy

1 Dover Street, London, W1S 4LD

Source: https://www.ampcleanenergy.com/contact-us

AMP provides biomass wood pellets and low carbon heat and power assets to the renewable energy industry in the UK.

Estover Energy Ltd

Central Working, Eccleston Yards, Eccleston Place, London, SW1W 9NF

Source: http://www.estover.co.uk/

Runs biomass power stations in Northumberland and Scotland, which have been met with local resistance (see p40 of this Biofuelwatch report).

Melton Renewable Energy Ltd (MRE)

33 Holborn, London, EC1N 2HT

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/09194088

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”. MRE’s main base is in Suffolk.

MRE runs five biomass power stations located at Thetford, Ely, Glanford, Eye and Westfield, which generate electricity from the combustion of poultry litter, straw, meat & bone meal, horse bedding and – like Drax – forestry wood chips.

1.4.3 Dams: hydropower companies

Statkraft

41 Moorgate, London, EC2R 6PP

Source: https://www.statkraft.com/energy-sources/Power-plants/UK/

Norway-based Statkraft is one of Europe’s largest renewable energy companies, and calls itself Europe’s biggest hydropower electricity producer. It has wind farms and hydropower plants in the UK and globally. But not everyone welcomes Stakraft’s dam building schemes. In Chile, indigenous Mapuche people are resisting the construction of several hydropower plants in their territory, including on sacred sites.

Shareholders: the parent company is owned by the Norwegian Ministry of trade.

See also: EDF, listed in Nuclear section above. And the construction section below for companies involved in dam building.

NB: not in the list: London does not have a large presence of hydropower companies. The world’s biggest dam generators are in China (above all, the massive Yangtse River Power Company) and the Americas, and do not have offices here. So far, river power is not a major source of energy in Europe – although this is set to change as major dam-building projects get underway, particularly in the Balkans.

1.5 Mining: metals and minerals

The mining industry is one of the dirtiest and most environmentally catastrophic, both in its scale and in its violence against people and planet. Mining uses huge amounts of water, often already in scarce supply. Mining operations inevitably involve the production of huge amounts of toxic waste, much of which finds its way onto cultivable land or into water sources. Waste is often stored in huge ‘tailing’ dams which then not infrequently collapse, spilling toxic sludge over whole communities, and destroying livelihoods. (See the London Mining Network’s useful explainer.) A recent dam collapse in Brazil, at a mine owned by Vale, caused 12 cubic metres of toxic tailings to be released, seeping into surrounding land and leading to the pollution of an estimated 300 km of water.

Companies greedy for valuable raw materials are likely to take shortcuts with environmental protections, if these even exist, and they ride roughshod over local needs. Violence against individuals and local communities is widespread, and may include forced evictions, as well as repression and murder of people who try to resist.

London is a major centre for the global mining industry. Many of the world’s mining giants are listed on the London, Stock Exchange, while the London Metals Exchange is the number one marketplace for industrial metals trading (See Part 2 on exchanges). The miners thus use London as a hub to raise finance, trade their products, and launder their profits.

The companies below have been selected on the basis of their size or number of operations, and on past records of environmental violence. Some key sources and further information: London Mining Network; Environmental Justice Atlas, The Rivers are Bleeding (War on Want)

NB: who’s not on the list: Some multinationals involved in coal mining – notably, Glencore and RWE – are listed below. However, the world’s very biggest coal miners are largely state-owned corporations – notably the massive Coal India Ltd, and the various Chinese coal companies – which do not have a presence in London. The world’s biggest private sector coal miner, US corporation Peabody Energy, has a “London” office that is actually in Guildford.

In terms of metals, notable companies without London offices include Anglo Gold Ashanti, Newmont Mining, and Eldorado Gold. Lonmin, the infamous London-based gold mining company involved in the 2012 Marikana massacre, has recently been bought by Sebanye Stillwater, based in South Africa.

RWE

60 Threadneedle Street, London, EC2R 8HP

Source: https://www.group.rwe/en/the-group/countries-and-locations/london

RWE is a major German energy company, notorious as Western Europe’s biggest coal burner. Its devastation of the Hambach forest near Cologne for open-cast coal mining continues to meet fierce resistance. RWE also has aggressive plans for burning millions of tonnes of wood – including in the UK, where it is planning to convert a second power station to biomass. Its biomass investment will mean more destruction of forests in Canada, the US and elsewhere.

Major s hareholders: KEB Holding, Blackrock

Glencore

50 Berkeley Street, London, W1J 8HD

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/search?q=glencore h ttps://architizer.com/projects/glencore-london-offices/

NB: reportedly will move to 18 Hanover Squar e, London W1S 1HD later in the second half of 2020.

Mining and commodities trading company, the world’s largest mining company by revenue. It is one of the world’s largest producers of zinc, copper and other metals, and also a major global coal miner. The company was formed from the merger of Glencore and XStrata in 2013: both have a terrible history of environmental fines, fatalities, health problems, dumping toxic assets, contamination of water, air, land. Glencore is part-owner of Cerrejon, a huge open-pit coal mine in Colombia (see Anglo American.) See: London Mining Network; EJAtlas.

Anglo American PLC

20 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AN

Source: https://www.angloamerican.com/sustainability/contacts

UK and South African multinational that is the world’s largest producer of platinum and a major producer of diamonds, copper, nickel, iron ore, metallurgical and thermal coal. Anglo American has violated indigenous land rights across the globe and polluted the water, agricultural land and air of many communities. It is co-owner (with Glencore and BHP) of the huge open-pit coal mine Cerrejon, in Colombia, where pollution and dust from the mine has caused contamination on a massive scale. In Brazil, it is facing strong opposition from local communities over its plan to expand a large tailings dam, the collapse of which would have horrific consequences. In the state of Chile, residents of El Melón are amongst those fighting its attacks on their land and water sources. See: London Mining Network. Also: EJAtlas company page.

BHP Group PLC

Nova South, 160 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 5LB

Source: https://www.bhp.com/contact-us/

BHP is one of the world’s largest mining companies, with 30 operations in 13 countries. It is among the top 25 fossil fuel producers worldwide. It is the joint owner of the Cerrejon coal mine (see Anglo American), and was responsible for the massive Samarco dam collapse in 2015, which spilt 45 million cubic metres of mining waste into the Rio Doce and its tributaries. BHP’s proposed copper mine in Tonto National Forest in the US would destroy 3,000 hectares of public land, harm endangered species, and threaten massive water loss and contamination. See: London Mining Network; EJAtlas.

Rio Tinto

6 St James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4AD

Source: https://www.riotinto.com/en/footer/contact

Rio Tinto is a huge multinational metals and mining corporation. It is a world leader in the production of aluminium, iron ore, copper, uranium, coal, and diamonds. According to the Carbon Majors Database it was responsible for 0.75% of the world’s carbon emissions between 1988 and 2015. Its Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold mine under development in Mongolia uses vast quantities of water in a desert region and poses a threat to pastoralist communities. In the USA, hundreds of premature deaths are blamed on air pollution from the Bingham Canyon mine: the single largest open pit mining operation and the deepest excavation of its kind in the world. See: London Mining Network; EJAtlas.

Vedanta Resources

30 Berkeley Square, Mayfair, London, W1J 6EX

Source: https://www.vedantaresources.com/pages/reachus.aspx

Global diversified metals and mining company whose main products are copper, zinc, aluminium, lead and iron ore. Vedanta’s plans for an open-pit bauxite mine in the Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa, India, threatens the Dongria Kondh community, who have resisted with a ten year struggle. In Zambia, thousands of victims of pollution from a copper mining subsidiary of Vedanta have been seeking justice for over 15 years.

1.6 Earth-killing infrastructure: engineering and construction

The energy and mining companies – including fossil fuels, nuclear and dams – do not act alone. They rely on major infrastructure support, including from the engineers who develop and support drillheads, pipelines, or nuclear reactors; and the construction companies who build their dams and power stations.

This section lists just some of the most prominent engineering and construction companies. It includes some global behemoths, and the top UK building firms that work on energy infrastructure and other big polluting projects such as motorway building. We also include a sub-section on cement production.

1.6.1 Energy conglomerates

We’re using this category for some big companies that have fingers in many pies: they could be listed in several sections.

Koch Industries

Koch Supply and Trading: 4^th Floor, 20 Gresham Street, London, EC2V 7JE

Source: https://www.ksandt.com/

The Koch family’s industrial empire includes oil refineries, chemical plants, fertilisers, paper mills, cattle ranches, commodities trading, investment funds … It might be quicker to list earth-wrecking activities they’re not involved in. They employ 130,000 people, just over half of those in the US but with a presence in 60 countries.

Owners: Koch family members. Koch Industries, with its many subsidiaries, is one of the world’s biggest privately owned companies. Charles Koch, and his brother David until his death in August 2019, have vigorously promoted their interests with large scale funding of an array of right-wing politicians and, above all, think tanks. Main agenda points have been climate change denial and opposition to environmental regulation or development of alternatives to fossil fuels, as well as union-busting and general free marketeering.

Noble Group

Office 6.01 Nova North, 11 Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5BY
Source: https://www.noblegroupholdings.com/contact-us/

Noble Group is a Hong Kong-based commodities conglomerate. Subsidiaries include metals mining and trading, liquefied natural gas, shipping, oil rig contracting, and more. It was delisted from the Singapore stock exchange in 2018 after a major fraud scandal, with investigations ongoing, and has since restructured.

1.6.2 International engineering and construction giants

Siemens

Siemens Mobility Limited: 7^th Floor, Euston House, 24 Eversholt Street, London, NW1 1AD

The Crystal (Siemens offices and exhibition centre): 1 Siemens Brothers Way, Royal Docks, London, E16 1GB

Source: https://new.siemens.com/uk/en/company/about/siemens-uk-locations.html https://thecrystal.org

Giant German conglomerate best known for industrial electrical engineering and consumer electronics. Siemens is providing signalling for the Carmichael mine: Indian mining company Adani’s plan for the biggest coalmine in Australian history.

(NB: UK head office is in Frimley, Surrey.)

Bechtel Corporation

11 Pilgrim Street, London, EC4V 6RN

Source: https://www.bechtel.com/about-us/offices/

The USA’s biggest building company, largely focusing on major energy and infrastructure schemes across the globe. Its business units include “Mining and Metals”, “Oil, Gas & Chemicals”, and “Nuclear, Security and Environmental”. It’s hard to know where to start with a list ofBechtel scandals and devastating projects: from massive war profiteering with a $680 million Iraq war contract, through sub-par Nuclear waste facilities, to pushing up water prices in Bolivia. Alongside the daily business of building dams, coal mines, motorways, pipelines, liquefied natural gas plants, nuclear power plants, chemical weapons stores, etc. Bechtel is highly connected in US politics, with a record of executives serving as cabinet ministers.

Ownership: remains controlled by the Bechtel family. Chairman and CEO Brendan Bechtel is fifth generation of the family in charge.

Vinci

VINCI Concessions UK: 1 Eversholt Street, London, NW1 2DN

Morgan VINCI Ltd: 77 Newman Street, London, W1T 3EW

Eurovia UK (transport construction subsidiary): 26 Store Street Fitzrovia Lane, London, WC1E 7BT

Taylor Woodrow (UK construction subsidiary): 286 Euston Road, Euston Tower Level 33, London, NW1A 3DP

Source: https://www.vinci.com/vinci.nsf/en/locations/pages/region_greater_london.htm

Massive French construction multinational, with numerous brands and subsidiaries, involved in a long list of devastating projects. It makes its biggest profits running much of the French toll-paying motorway system. Planned developer of the Notre Dame des Landes airport in western France, which was scrapped in 2019 after an epic campaign of resistance including the long-running ZAD land occupation. Accused of using forced labour in Qatar, bulldozing migrant camps in Calais, and engaging in corruption and massive environmental destruction in Russia’s Khimki Forest motorway scheme. See Corporate Watch company profile (from 2017). Recently, its subsidiary Spiecapag is involved in the Adani Carmichael coal mine in Australia, which is being vigorously resisted.

Owners: French PLC. Its biggest owners include BlackRock and the government of Qatar, amongst many other global investment funds.

1.6.3 UK big builders

Balfour Beatty

5 Churchill Place, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5HU
Source: www.balfourbeatty.com/contacts/

Balfour Beatty Investments: 350 Euston Road, Regent’s Place, London, NW1 3AX

Source: http://www.balfourbeattyinvestments.com/company/about.aspx

Major British building company focusing on big infrastructure. Heavily involved in road building, and one of the main contractors in the UK’s white elephant HS2 rail scheme. Infamous for its record of trade union blacklisting. Also responsible for dams in Asia and Africa – was involved in early plans for Turkey’s Ilisu dam, but later pulled out after large scale protests.

Kier Group

33 Foley Street, London, W1W 7TL

Source: https://www.kier.co.uk/contact/our-locations/?area=london&id=3545

Major UK construction company. W orks on energy infrastructure – including nuclear – and road building, as well as house building. Another of the big UK builders involved in the infamous union-busting blacklist.

Sir Robert McAlpine

4th Floor, 63 St Mary’s Axe, London, EC3A 8AA

Source: https://www.srm.com/office-locations/london/

Major UK construction and civil engineering firm which works on oil and gas, nuclear, dams, chemical and mining sectors as well as other high-profile building schemes. It was the main building company responsible for setting up the “Consulting Association” union-busting blacklist scheme.

Morgan Sindell

Kent House, 14-17 Market Place, London, W1W 8AJ

Source: https://www.morgansindall.com/contact-us/

Major British construction and engineering firm. Its infrastructure division works on nuclear and defence infrastructure, including at the Faslane nuclear submarine base. It also has a sideline in prison building.

Amey UK

10 Furnival Street, London, EC4A 1AB

Source: http://tpt.amey.co.uk/contact-us/

Sixth in the list of UK construction companies, Amey is also well known for engineering services and “facilities” management to the energy industry, road maintenance, airports, and more. It also maintains 61 British prisons, and has gone further into the profitable “justice” business with its GEOAmey prisoner transporting joint venture. Also known for cutting down thousands of trees in Sheffield as part of its PFI deal with the council.

Owner: bought by Spanish building company Ferrovial.

1.6.4 Cement producers

Cement is a massively destructive product: according to the Chatham House think tank, it is responsible for 8% of CO2 emissions. Concrete production is also linked to extensive soil erosion, water pollution and flooding.

None of the major cement producers are based in London. The biggest of all are based in China and serve that country’s massive construction industry. The UK’s cement needs are served by multinationals which largely have centres outside the capital: LafargeHolcim’s UK plant is in Leicester; Heidelberg’s building subsidiary Hanson is based in Maidenhead; and the Mexican giant Cemex has a UK HQ in Rugby. Below we list offices for a subsidiary of one other major cement producers.

CRH (Tarmac)

Tarmac: Level 4, 40 Strand, London, WC2N 5RW

Source: http://tarmac.com/location-finder//find-a-site?location=London

CRH is the 7th largest cement multinational. It is an Irish registered company, listed on the London Stock exchange. In the UK, it is best known as the owner of Tarmac. CRH has been involved in several alleged corruption controversies in Ireland and Poland.

1.7 Agribusiness

Corporate agriculture has become infamous for its negative effect on the planet and the climate. The list for this sector is thinner – London is not a hub for agribusiness companies in the same way as hydrocarbons or mining. UK agribusiness tends to be regionally based: e.g., Bernard Matthews’ famous Norfolk poultry farming, or fishing fleets in coastal ports. A major exception, listed below, is the giant of ABF.

The biggest global agricorps are US companies (particularly for soya and meat), with East Asia cornering the palm oil and sea food industries. The world’s largest chemical fertiliser giant – also Europe’s biggest buyer of natural gas – Yara, is a Norwegian company with no London base (see Corporate Watch profile). We’ve also included in this section major global food companies that are key customers of the big agribusiness corps, and in some cases also run their own agro-industry supply chains.

ABF (Associated British Foods)

Weston Centre 10 Grosvenor Street London, W1K 4QY
Source: www.abf.co.uk/m/contact-us

British consumer and agribusiness conglomerate. It owns household brands including Ovaltine, Ryvita, Twinings tea, and many more. Agribusiness division AB Agri is involved in animal feed, biofuels, and other products in the UK and China. Its AB Sugar division is one of the world’s biggest sugar empires, including Silver Spoon (which buys almost all UK sugar beet), Ilovo Sugar in southern Africa, Azucarera in Spain, AB Sugar China, and other companies. According to the World Wildlife Fund: “The cultivation and processing of sugar produce environmental impacts through the loss of natural habitats, intensive use of water, heavy use of agro-chemicals, discharge and runoff of polluted effluent and air pollution.” On top of all that, ABF also owns the infamous Primark clothing chain, renowned for miserable labour conditions and the death of over 1,000 people in the Rana Plaza factory collapse.

Owners: 55% owned by Wittington Investments, other shares publicly traded.

Cargill

3rd Floor, 77 Queen Victoria Street, London, EC4V 4AY
Source: www.cargill.co.uk/en/london-location

The largest privately held company in the world, Cargill is regarded as one of two companies most closely linked to Brazilian deforestation for its soya destined for the livestock industry. Besides Amazon destruction, it is also involved in UK mega factory farms, is one of the world’s biggest traders in palm oil, and is tied to rainforest destruction in South East Asia, deforestation in West Africa and child slavery. Cargill has more than 60 subsidiaries.

Owners: The Cargill-Macmillan family, one of the wealthiest in the US, reportedly own over 85% of the company .

Archer Daniels Midland (ADM)

ADM Investor Services International Limited: Millennium Bridge House, 2 Lambeth Hill, London, EC4V 3TT
Source: www.admisi.com/contact

ADM is a major US food processing company dealing in Amazon s oya, palm oil and biofuels, among other commodities. Prior to joining ADM, the company’s CEO Juan R Luciano spent 25 years at Dow Chemical. He also sits on the board of directors of pharma giant Eli Lilly and palm oil plunderers Wilmar International. ADM have various joint ventures and a history of cooperation with Wilmar. NB: the London office belongs to ADMSI, an investment brokerage subsidiary.

Owners: listed company, owned by big investment funds including Vanguard, as well as State Farm Investment Management Corp.

Louis Dreyfus Trading

The Crane Building, 22 Lavington Street, London, SE1 0NK
Source: https://www.ldc.com/global/en/about-us/locations1/

An enormous agribusiness covering all parts of the supply chain, involved in Amazon soya. A subsidiary of the Dutch-based Louis Dreyfus Company (LDC).

Owners: billionaire Margarita Louis-Dreyfus whose family trust Akira now owns over 95% of the holding company.

Olam International

New Zealand House, 80 Haymarket London, SW1Y 4TE

Source: https://www.olamgroup.com/contactus.html

Singapore-based company and major producer of cash crops, particularly palm oil. Olam is engaged in massive deforestation and has been accused of serious human rights abuses. Allegations include razing an area of pristine forest in Gabon the size of Washington DC for its rubber plantations and driving land grabs and evictions in Laos.

Owners: Olam’s largest shareholders are Temasek Holdings and Mitsubishi Corporation – Singaporean sovereign wealth fund and Japanese bank.

Unilever plc
Unilever House, 100 Victoria Embankment, London, EC4Y 0DY
Source: https://www.unilever.com/contact/unilever-registered-offices/

Massive Dutch-British consumer goods company which owns numerous household food and cosmetics brands, and has a long record of environmental scandals. Major users of palm oil, connected to rainforest clearances in South East Asia and West Africa, as well as to child labour. Also identified by Break Free from Plastic as one of the world’s top ten plastics users.

Tata Group
18 Grosvenor Place, London, SW1X 7HS
Source: www.tata.com/contact-us #

Massive Indian multinational conglomerate with over 700,000 employees. It could feature in a number of sections: various divisions own coal mines, power plants, steel mills, hotel chains, one of the word’s biggest IT companies, Jaguar Landrover cars, and a massive list of household consumer products. Tata Global Beverages, which includes the Tetley tea brand, is one of the world’s biggest tea and coffee plantation owners. Tata’s iron works, chemical plants, and plantations have been connected to land grabs, police shootings, pollution incidents, workers’ disputes, and more.

Owners: Tata family. The majority of shares are owned by the Tata Sons holding company, which in turn is owned by family trusts. The family business goes back to the 1860s, when it was involved in the opium trade. Some Tata subsidiaries have a minority of shares traded in the open market.

Burger King

4th Floor, 2 Fouberts Place, W1F 7PA
Source: www.burgerking.co.uk/privacy

Huge global meat user. A major customer of Cargill. In a 2016 report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, BK scored a zero for failing to make any notable progress round the issue of deforestation. The company has since pledged to eliminate deforestation from its supply chain – by 2030!

Owners: the parent company is a Canadian holding company called Restaurant Brands International (RBI), 32% of which is owned by Brazilian private equity fund 3G Capital; another major shareholder is Morgan Stanley (see the banks section in Part 2.)

(NB: many of the same points could be made about McDonalds as Burger King. The only reason we don’t include them is because the London office is outside our map area in East Finchley.)

1.8 Plastics and other chemical polluters

Like agribusiness, the chemicals industry does not have the same presence in London as hydrocarbons or mining. Only two of the global top ten plastics producers have offices in the city. Dow DuPont, the world’s biggest chemical company and number one plastics producer, notorious for the Bhopal disaster, is about to set up its UK and Ireland base in a “state-of-the-art business park” in Stockport. The second biggest UK-based company, Linde, has its HQ in Guildford, Surrey.

BASF

BASF Metals Limited: 21st Floor, Bishopsgate, London, EC2N 4AY
Source: https://www.basf.com/gb/en/who-we-are/BASF-in-the-United-Kingdom/BASF-Metals-Limited–BML-.html

BASF is the world’s second largest chemicals company (after the merged Dow Dupont). It is among the biggest manufacturers of plastics and of pesticides and also has a biotech arm, BASF Plant Science. (NB: The London office belongs to its Metals division.)

Ineos

Ineos HQ: 38 Hans Cres, London, SW1X 0LZ
Source: www.ineos.com/contact/

Ineos oil and gas: Anchor House, 15-19 Britten St, London, SW3 3TY, UK
Source: www.ineos.com/businesses/ineos-oil–gas…/

Ineos is the UK’s biggest chemical company, and the world’s fifth biggest. It operates through dozens of subsidiary companies. The Petroineos joint venture with China’s state oil company CNPC is Europe’s biggest oil refiner. Its flagship base is Grangemouth, which is “home to Scotland’s only crude oil refinery and produces the bulk of fuels used in Scotland.” Ineos’ “Dragon Ship” LNG tankers ferry US shale gas to the site. Ineosalso has its own oil and gas exploration arm, well known for its attempts to start fracking in the UK, which has bought up the majority of shale gas exploration licenses here.

See also: detailed company profile from Spinwatch / Powerbase; new Corporate Watch profile on Ineos’ billionaire owner Jim Ratcliffe.

Owner: billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, listed as Britain’s richest person by the Sunday Times Rich List 2018, founded the company and still owns 60%. Ineos is one of the UK’s biggest privately held companies (as opposed to listed PLCs).

Lyondellbasell

4th Floor, One Vine Street, London, W1J 0AH

Source: https://www.lyondellbasell.com/en/london-office/contact-us/

Major chemical multinational, registered in the Netherlands but with a London HQ. It is a plastic specialist, the world’s third biggest plastics producer. It describes itself as the leading US and European producer of polypropyenes – one of the plastics widely used in packaging responsible for massive environmental pollution.

Owners: PLC, listed on New York SE.

Coca-Cola

1A Wimpole St, London, W1G 0EA
Source: https://www.coca-cola.co.uk/about-us/contact-us

We include Coca Cola here as the world’s number one plastic consumer products polluter, according to Break Free From Plastic. There are plenty of other environmental and human scandals linked to the company, from groundwater depletion in India to support for Apartheid South Africa or the Israeli far-right.

NB: Pepsico’s UK office is in Berkshire.

2. Secondary planet-killers

2.1 Banks

The City of London is one of the world’s main finance hubs, second only to New York. It is particularly important as a trading and money laundering centre for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA, in bankers’ jargon), and for oil and other “commodities”. Three of the world’s major investment banks have their headquarters here: HSBC, Barclays, and RBS. And all of the other big global banks have London offices.

Banks play an essential part in ecocidal capitalism, channelling the money that companies need to develop new projects. Their key roles include:

Lending money directly to companies – in big cases, these may be multi-million dollar “syndicated loans” involving “syndicates” of numerous banks.
Arranging for other investors to put their money into companies through bonds and shares.
Trading these bonds and shares.
Helping companies arrange takeovers, buy-outs, property sales, and other corporate deals.

This section lists: first, the state-owned Chinese “Big Four” banks; then, the top 10 global investment banks, as well as other notable multinational investment banks. All of them, without a single exception, are involved in funding the fossil fuel drillers, coal diggers, forest clearers, river foulers, and other earth-wreckers – including the companies listed in Part 1, and many more.

The Chinese state-owned banks have been largely focused on financing China’s rapid industrial growth – including the country’s massive coal industry, which accounts for much of the worldwide production of the dirtiest of fuels. Increasingly, they are also becoming involved in deals across the globe. They are leading players in the industrial exploitation of Africa and other regions where China is increasingly replacing the “West” as main neo-colonial power.

But, for now, the US, European and Japanese multinationals are still the biggest of all fossil fuel funders. According to research by the Rainforest Action Network, Banktrack, and other partners, the world’s top 33 private sector banks have pumped $1.9 trillion into financing fossil fuels since 2016. And London is where many of these deals are done.

Key sources and further reading:

Banktrack: website has a big list of hundreds of banks worldwide, with profile pages identifying their “dodgy deals”.
Standard & Poors’ list of world’s 100 biggest banks (by total assets)
ADV Ratings list of top (privately-owned) investment banks 2019 (by investment banking revenue)
Banking on Climate Change report (April 2019) from Rainforest Action Network (RAN), Banktrack and other partners
Updated Guardian / RAN list of climate change funders (October 2019)

2.1.1 China’s Big Four

ICBC (Industrial and Commercial Bank of China)

ICBC (London), City Branch: 81 King William Street, London, EC4N 7BG
Chinatown Branch: 81-85 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, W1D 5DX

Source: https://www.icbc.com.cn/ICBC/EN/PersonalFinance/CrossborderFinancialServices/OverseasFinancialService/ICBCLondon/

By one metric, the biggest bank in the world, holding assets of over $4 trillion, mostly thanks to its key role in China’s huge economy. It is the third largest funder of global coal mining. Involved in funding the massive Gilgel Gibe III dam in Ethiopia, “Africa’s most destructive dam”. Rapidly expanding its reach beyond China, ICBC now lends to coal mining projects in Turkey, Vietnam and Kenya, and even to pipeline projects in North America, including the highly contested Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL).

Owners: 75% owned by Chinese government via Ministry of Finance and Central Huijin Investment company. 25% of shares are traded publicly on the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges.

China Construction Bank

111 Old Broad Street,London, EC2N 1AP

Source: http://www.uk.ccb.com/london/en/index.html

One of the world’s biggest banks and the biggest financer of coal mining. Active in deals across Asia, Africa and beyond, including many environmentally destructive infrastructure projects.

Owners: majority owned by Chinese government (including through state-owned Central Huijin Investment company). Shares listed on Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges.

Agricultural Bank of China

7/F, 1 Bartholomew Lane, London, EC2N 2AX

Source: http://www.uk.abchina.com/en/contact_us/

One of the world’s biggest banks and the fourth biggest funder of global coal mining.

Owners: largely owned by Chinese government (including 40% through state-owned Central Huijin Investment company). Shares listed on Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges.

Bank of China

2 Lothbury, London, EC2R 7DB

Chinatown branch: 107 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, W1D 5DA

Source: https://www.bankofchina.com/uk/aboutus/ab3/201110/t20111003_1578162.html

One of the world’s biggest banks and the second biggest funder of global coal mining.

Owners: majority owned by Chinese government (including 64% through state-owned Central Huijin Investment company). Shares listed on Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges.

2.1.2 Top 20 multinational investment banks

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group

Ropemaker Place, 25 Ropemaker Street, London, EC2Y 9AN

Source: https://www.bk.mufg.jp/global/globalnetwork/emea/london.html

One of the world’s biggest banks and the biggest in Japan, with $2.8 trillion dollars of assets to its name. Seventh in RAN’s list of “top investors in climate change” list, and sixth biggest funder of coal power plants.

JPMorgan Chase

25 Bank Street, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5JP

Source: https://www.jpmorgan.com/country/US/EN/jpmorgan/disclosures/uk_entities_jul2012

The world’s biggest funder of fossil fuels and the biggest of all the US-based banks. According to the Rainforest Action Network list, in the last three years it has lent $196 billion to the fossil fuels industries. It is the leading financier of Arctic oil and gas exploration, deepwater drilling projects, and the second biggest funder of fracking worldwide. Besides lending money and arranging deals as an investment bank, JP Morgan is also a major fund manager and shareholder, managing $2.1 trillion.

HSBC

8 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5HQ

Source: https://www.hsbc.com/who-we-are/contact-us?countryid=GB&tab=Offices

The biggest UK-based bank and a top ten investment bank. Also one of UK’s biggest investment fund managers. Thirteenth in RAN’s list of massive global fossil fuel funders. Frack Off names it as one of the fracking “bad guys” for lending £63 million to Dart Energy, of whom it has been a shareholder, and providing banking services to Cuadrilla. HSBC invested $7 billion in coal between 2005 and 2014, and continues as the biggest UK coal financer since 2015. It is a ccused by Greenpeace of funding massive deforestation of the Indonesian rainforest for palm oil production. In other news, HSBC has been repeatedly caught involved in large scale money-laundering schemes: to name one example, it was fined $1.9 billion (or “about five weeks’ profits”) by US authorities in 2012 for laundering blood money for the Mexican drug cartels. As has been pointed out, this business line could be traced right back to the bank’s historical links with the 19^th century British opium trade.

Citigroup

Citigroup Centre, 33 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5LB

Source: https://www.citigroup.com/citi/about/countries-and-jurisdictions/united-kingdom.htm l

Citi is one of the world’s top ten investment banks, and is third in the RAN “top investors in climate change” list. Besides oil and gas investment, it is the main non-Chinese funder of the global coal industry. It is a funder of the Dakota Access and other pipeline projects. It lends money and underwrites bonds for numerous companies on this map, including the likes of RWE, Saudi Aramco, or Vale.

Goldman Sachs

Plumtree Court, 25 Shoe Lane, London, EC4A 4AU

Christchurch Court, 10-15 Newgate Street, London, EC1A 7HD

Source: https://www.goldmansachs.com/our-firm/locations.html

The “giant vampire squid”: extremely powerful investment bank known for the global politicians who have been on its payroll, its role in the 2008 “sub-prime” crash, and a multitude of further scandals. One of biggest ten global investment banks. Provided $59 billion to the fossil fuel industry in 2016-2018, putting it twel f th on RAN’s list. Significantly linked to Amazon deforestation through its investments in beef producers JBS and Marfrig.

Bank of America

Financial Centre, 2 King Edward Street, London, EC1A 1HQ

Source: https://www.bofaml.com/content/boaml/en_us/contactus.html

Another massive US multinational, one of the biggest ten global investment banks. Also a major fund manager with $1.13 trillion Assets Under Management. Comes fourth in the RAN overall fossil fuel funders list, and third on fracking and deepwater exploration. Provided half a billion dollars in credit to Minerva foods, implicated in severe Amazon desforestation. Has funded Adani, RWE, Wilmar, and many more earth wreckers.

Wells Fargo

33 King William Street London, EC4R 9AT

Source: https://wellsfargocapitalfinance.com/uk/contact/

Another massive US multinational, one of the top ten global investment banks. The world’s biggest investor in fracking, and second overall (after JP Morgan) in RAN’s list of banks financing the fossil fuel industry.

Morgan Stanley

25 Cabot Square, Canary Wharf London, E14 4QA

Source: https://www.morganstanley.com/about-us/global-offices/europe-middle-east-africa/united-kingdom

One of biggest ten global investment banks, and number 11 in the RAN list of top fossil fuels funders. One of the top investors in ultra deepwater oil and gas companies. Also a top global fund manager with $1.6 trillion assets under management.

Barclays

5 The North Colonnade, Canary Wharf London, E14 4BB

Source: https://www.investmentbank.barclays.com/contact-us/gb.html

Second biggest UK-based bank, and the number one European investor in fossil fuels. One of the biggest ten global investment banks. Investor in UK fracker Third Energy, which is 97% owned by Barclays Natural Resource Investments, a private equity arm of the bank. Financed Olam, responsible for deforesting approximately 20,000 hectares of forest inside its Gabonese oil palm plantations since March 2012.

Credit Suisse

1 Cabot Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 4QJ

Source: https://www.credit-suisse.com/us/en/investment-banking/contact-us.html

Major Swiss bank, one of the top ten global investment banks. Also a major global fund manager with $1.43 trillion. Provided $57 billion of investment into fossil fuels in 2016-2018. Linked to financing Halcyon Agri, whose operations have been described as the “the most devastating new forest clearance for industrial agriculture in the Congo basin.”

Deutsche Bank

1 Great Winchester Street, London, EC2N 2DB

Source: https://www.db.com/unitedkingdom/

Germany’s biggest bank, and one of the biggest ten global investment banks. Also a major fund manager managing $1.36 trillion. The second largest financier of Arctic oil and gas. Invested $14 billion dollars in fossil fuels globally in 2018. Implicated in deforestation in Brazil through its $11 million shareholding in JBS. One of the funders of the Dakota Access Pipeline. Involved in multiple money-laundering, tax evasion and fraud scandals: its $10 billion Russian mafia money laundry, for which it was fined by US authorities in 2017, is just one of the best known cases to come to light. Longstanding financial backer of Donald Trump. One of the main banks responsible for the CDO bubble that initiated the 2008 financial crash. Going further back, Deutsche was a major profiteer from the Third Reich, including its “aryanisation” and slave labour programmes, and helped fund the construction of Auschwitz.

Royal Bank of Canada

RBC Europe Limited: Thames Court Office, One Queenhithe, London, EC4V 3DQ

and: Riverbank House, 2 Swan Lane, London, EC4R 3BF

Source: https://www.rbccm.com/en/offices/europe.page

Canada’s biggest bank, and one of biggest ten global investment banks. RBC is the biggest funder of the Canadian tar sands exploitation. Also funds contested pipelines in Canada and the US, as well as illegal settlement activity in the Palestinian occupied territories.

UBS

5 Broadgate, London, EC2M 2QS

Source: https://www.ubs.com/uk/en/wealth-management/about-us.html

The biggest Swiss bank, one of biggest ten global investment banks. Also the world’s third largest investment manager with $3.2 trillion of assets managed. Provided the fossil fuel companies with some $25 billion in 2016-18.

BNP Paribas

10 Harewood Avenue, London, NW1 6AA

Source: https://www.bnpparibas.co.uk/en/contact/bnp-paribas-securities-services/

The biggest French bank and the world’s 9 th largest bank by total assets. Provided $51 billion fossil fuels funding in 2016-18. Also a major investment manager with $1.21 trillion AUM.

Toronto Dominion

60 Threadneedle Street London, EC2R 8AP

Source: http://www.tdsecurities.com/tds/content/AU_WorldwideOffices?language=en_CA&language=en_CA

Canadian multinational investment bank. It is number 8 in RAN’s list of fossil fuel funders, and in particular is a major funder of tar sands – the second biggest after RBC, with $13.7 billion investment in 2016-18.

Scotiabank

6th Floor, 201 Bishopsgate, London, EC2M 3NS

Source: https://www.scotiabank.com/global/en/country/united-kingdom.htm l

Multinational which has been described as Canada’s most ‘international bank’ due to its overseas acquisitions. Though not one of the world’s very top banks, it punches well above its weight in terms of earth-wrecking: coming number nine in RAN’s list of fossil fuel industry funders.

Owners: PLC.

Mizuho

Mizuho House, 30 Old Bailey, London, EC4M 7AU

Source: https://www.mizuhobank.com/uk/about/index.html

Major Japanese multinational investment bank, which comes number ten in the RAN ratings for banks funding fossil fuels.

Société Générale

1 Bank Street, Canary Wharf, E14 4SG

Source: https://www.societegenerale.co.uk/en/one-bank-street/

French multinational investment bank. The world’s second biggest funder of Liqu e fied Natural Gas (after JP Morgan Chase).

Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS)

250 Bishopsgate, Spitalfields, London, EC2M 4AA

Source: https://www.investors.rbs.com/multimedia-library/image-library/our-buildings.aspx

Third biggest UK bank, which operates under a number of brands including also NatWest and Ulster Bank. Back in 2007 it openly marketed itself as the “oil and gas bank”, and was a major funder of climate change. More recently, RBS has sought to win a “greener” reputation and claims to have now ended funding for Arctic drilling or new coal plants. Beyond the Arctic, though, RBS still funds fossil fuels, stating that “oil and gas will continue to play an important role in the overall global energy mix”.

NB: most investment banking operations are now branded as “NatWest markets”.

Ownership: bailed out by the UK government after the 2008 crash which became the main owner. The government has been selling its shares in batches, but is still currently the main owner with over 60%.

Source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/01/23/rbs-sell-london-hq-cost-cutting-drive-continues/

Standard Chartered

1 Basinghall Avenue, London, EC2V 5DD

Source: https://www.sc.com/uk/contact-us/

London-based international investment bank: though based in the UK, it only works on deals outside the country. Invested $15 billion in fossil fuels 2016-18.

2.1.3 Multilateral development banks

The “multilaterals” are financial institutions backed by the power and wealth of several states – as opposed to national banks owned by just one government. Their usual role is financing major infrastructure and development schemes. The best known is the World Bank, which lends money and arranges finance largely for “less developed” countries. These deals come with big strings attached – related to fostering free market capitalism, so “opening” new markets for global investors.

Besides the World Bank, there is a second tier of regional development banks which are big fish in their smaller ponds. London is home to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which is a major actor pushing for privatisation and destructive infrastructure schemes, particularly in Eastern Europe.

The World Bank

Millbank Tower, 12th Floor, 21-24 Millbank, London, SW1P 4QP

Source: https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/unitedkingdom

Based in Washington, this is the UK country office. Despite official statements, the WB continues to fund fossil fuel infrastructure.

European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)

One Exchange Square, London, EC2A 2JN

Source: https://www.ebrd.com/corporate-information/london-headquarters.html

(NB: will move to new HQ in Canary Wharf in 2022)

Headquartered in London, the EBRD was set up in 1991 by an alliance of governments and institutions with a specific aim: the rapid large-scale privatisation of Eastern Europe after the fall of the Soviet bloc. This achieved, it became a major infrastructure financier, still mainly focusing on the less-developed east. In the last five years the bank has presented itself as leading transition to the “green economy”, with over 40% of its investments dedicated to this. In one of these “green” schemes, the EBRD has become the main funder pushing an enormous programme of hydropower dam-building across the Balkans. As resistance grows, this is set to become a major battle for the European ecological future.

2.1.4 Smaller specialist banks

The banks above are some of the world’s biggest. Of course there are many others, involved in millions of earth-wrecking deals, and hundreds have locations in London. In this section we just name a few examples that have received attention for their work financing oil, mining and other primary planet-killing sectors.

Halkbank

Floor 1, 48 Dover Street, London, W1S 4FF

Source: https://www.halkbank.com.tr/en/International-Banking/92/foreign-branches

Halkbank is a Turkish state-owned bank, the seventh largest bank in Turkey. It is one of the three main banks financing the immensely destructive Ilisu dam project, which threatens to flood the ancient city of Hasnkeyf, displacing tens of thousands of mainly Kurdish people, and divert key water supplies to Iraq and Syria.

Garanti Bank / BBVA

BBVA UK: 44th floor, 1 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5AA

Source: https://www.bbvauk.com/meta/branches-and-atm/

BBVA is one of Spain’s biggest banks, which also has a major presence in Latin America. It also owns 49.85% of Turkey’s Garanti Bank, the country’s second largest privately owned bank. This is one of three main banks financing the immensely destructive Ilisu dam project, which threatens to flood the ancient city of Hasnkeyf, displacing tens of thousands of mainly Kurdish people, and divert key water supplies to Iraq and Syria.

Unicredit

Moor House, 120 London, Wall, London, EC2Y 5ET

Source: https://www.unicreditgroup.eu/en/worldwide/our-worldwide-presence/europe/united-kingdom/unicredit-bank-ag—branch.html

Unicredit is an Italian corporate and investment bank active across Europe. It has been identified by Bankwatch as one of the two main commercial banks (alongside the multilateral EBRD) financing devastating Balkan rivers dam projects.

Erste Group

24th Floor, 110 Bishopsgate, London, EC2N 4AY

Source: https://register.fca.org.uk/ShPo_FirmDetailsPage?id=001b000000MfFC8AAN; https://www.erstegroup.com/content/dam/at/eh/www_erstegroup_com/en/Corporates/london-branch-privacy-notice.pdf

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Austrian bank active in central and eastern Europe. It has been identified by Bankwatch as one of the two main commercial banks (alongside the multilateral EBRD) financing devastating Balkan rivers dam projects.

Macquarie Group

Ropemaker Place, 28 Ropemaker Street, London, EC2Y 9HD

Source: https://www.macquarie.com/uk/about/office-locations

Australian bank, the country’s largest investment bank. Specialises in infrastructure finance and is known for financing metals, bulk commodities (coal, iron ore, industrial minerals and uranium) and upstream oil and gas. Perhaps most notorious in the UK as the owner of Thames Water, which it saddled with an extra £2 billion of debt before selling on. Thames Water was fined £20 million for raw sewage dumps at six different sites in 2012-14 during Macquarie’s tenure.

RFC Ambrian

Octagon Point, 5 Cheapside, London, EC2V 6AA

Source: https://www.rfcambrian.com/index.php/contact/

Boutique energy bank which d escribes itself as the “global leading independent adviser and investor in the natural resources market, with a particular emphasis on metals and mining, oil & gas sectors and emerging technologies.”

Simmons Energy

13th Floor, 88 Wood Street, London, EC2V 7DA

Source: http://www.simmonspsc.com/2col.aspx?id=5284

Boutique oil and gas investment bank and energy securities trader with offices in Houston, London and Aberdeen. In 2018 it arranged deals involving Halliburton, Noble Energy, and many smaller oil and gas companies, as well as raising debt for an unnamed “private frac company”. Subsidiary of investment bank Piper Sandler.

Owners: a division of Piper Sandler.

Lambert Energy Advisory

4th Floor, 17 Hill Street, London, W1J 5LJ

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/03838151

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Small investment bank which works on oil and gas deals. Described in the financial press as a “publicity shy London boutique” – it doesn’t have a website. The financial media present CEO Richard Lambert as a svengali figure making major behind-the-scenes deals – for example, arranging a £10 billion share deal between BP and Rosneft. He has particular Russian connections, having cut his teeth in the great Russian privatisation sell-offs of the 1990s.

Natrium Capital

10 Bloomsbury Way, London, WC1A 2SL

Source: https://www.natriumcapital.com/contact/location/

Boutique investment advisor, specialised in arranging M&A deals for chemicals and biotech companies.

The Valence Group

1st Floor, New Fetter Place, 8-10 New Fetter Lane, London, EC4A 1AZ

Source: http://www.valencegroup.com/contact/

Boutique investment bank focusing on chemicals companies.

2.2 Investment funds

2.2.1 Top 20 Institutional Investors

Much of the world’s finance capital is controlled by “institutional investors”: fund management companies which manage the assets of pension funds, savings funds, insurance companies, and wealthy families and individuals. They funnel capital to companies by buying shares, also called “equity”. They also lend money, largely by buying bonds and other “debt securities” issued by companies.

The world’s top investment funds each control massive amounts of capital. They own shares and bonds of basically every major publicly listed company (PLC) in the world – as well as many unlisted ones. For this reason, in this section we don’t note particular companies the funds have invested in: you can safely assume they will have shares in many, or even all, of the listed companies named in Part 1.

In this section we list the top 20 global funds by “assets under management” – the amount of capital they control. (Except for those that are also major banks, and so already named in section 2.1 above.) All of these big funds have London offices.

See also: ADV Ratings list of investment managers by AUM.

BlackRock

12 Throgmorton Avenue, Drapers Gardens, London, EC2N 2DL

Source: https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/about-us/contacts-locations

The world’s biggest investment manager, managing over $6.5 trillion dollars worth of assets, with shares in pretty much every major listed company in the world. This makes BlackRock a massively powerful institution that influences every aspect of global capitalism. Based in the US, it is “the world’s biggest backer of fossil fuel companies”, according to the blackrocksbigproblem campaign.

Vanguard Group

25 Walbrook, London, EC4N 8AF

Source: https://www.institutional.vanguard.co.uk/portal/site/institutional/uk/en/contact-us

The second biggest global investor after BlackRock, managing $5.6 trillion. Largely an “index” investor that allocates funds to every major company on the world’s exchanges – including, of course, many of the biggest polluters.

State Street

20 Churchill Pl, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5HJ

Source: https://www.ssga.com/global/en/about-us/who-we-are/overview.html

US bank and one of the world’s biggest investment managers, with $2.8 trillion assets managed.

Fidelity

4 Cannon Street, London, EC4M 5AB

Source: https://www.fidelityrecruitment.com/uk-ireland/our-locations/working-fidelity-uk

Major US-based global investment manager, with $2.7 trillion assets.

Allianz (and Pimco)

Pimco: 11 Baker Street, London, W1U 3AH

Source: https://www.pimco.co.uk/en-gb/account/registration

Allianz is a giant German insurance and financial services company, which also now owns Pimco – a massive global investment fund specialising in bonds. Pimco alone controls $1.8 trillion Assets Under Management, the bulk of the $2.4 trillion Allianz manages overall.

Capital Group

40 Grosvenor Place, London, SW1X 7GG

Source: https://www.capitalgroup.com/about-us/office-locations.html#

US fund manager overseeing $1.86 trillion.

Bank of New York Mellon

160 Queen Victoria Street, London, EC4V 4LA

Source: https://www.bnymellon.com/emea/en/contact.jsp

US bank and fund manager overseeing $1.84 trillion.

Amundi (Credit Agricole)

41 Lothbury, London, EC2R 7HF

Source: https://www.amundi.co.uk/professional/About-Amundi/Amundi-London-Branch

French fund manager, part of the group of Credit Agricole bank. Has $1.6 trillion Assets Under Management.

AXA

AXA UK PLC: 5 Old Broad Street, London, EC2N 1AD

Source: https://www.axa.co.uk/about/addresses/

French insurance giant and fund manager. Manages $1.6 trillion.

Prudential

Grand Buildings, 1-3 Strand, Trafalgar Square, London, WC2N 5HR

Source: https://www.prudential.com/links/about/worldwide-locations/uk

US fund manager – not to be confused with the UK’s Prudential PLC (which is also in the list, below). Manages $1.5 trillion.

Legal & General Investment Management

LGIM: One Coleman Street, London, EC2R 5AA

Source: https://www.lgim.com/uk/en/contact/

UK insurance company and fund manager. The biggest UK-based investor. Manages $1.32 trillion.

Northern Trust

50 Bank Street, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5NT

Source: https://locations.northerntrust.com/gb/london/50-bank-street

US fund manager overseeing $1.16 trillion.

Other UK-based funds in global top 50:

Prudential PLC

1 Angel Court, London, EC2R 7AG

Source: https://www.prudentialplc.com/contacts/prudential-plc

UK insurer and fund manager (NB: don’t confuse with the bigger Prudential from the US). Manages $856 billion.

Insight Investment

160 Queen Victoria Street, London, EC4V 4LA

Source: https://www.insightinvestment.com/uk/

UK-based fund manager with $844 billion assets under management.

Standard Life Aberdeen

30 St Mary Axe (The Gherkin), EC3A 8BF

Source: https://www.standardlifeaberdeen.com/who-we-are/global-locations

Source: https://www.aberdeenstandardcapital.com/en/about-us/our-offices

UK fund manager, has $676 billion assets under management.

Aviva

St Helen’s, 1 Undershaft, London, EC3P 3DQ
Source: https://www.aviva.com/about-us/registered-address/

UK investment manager with $612 billion assets under management.

NB: these other top fund managers are listed above in section 2.1 on investment banks:

UBS Group

JP Morgan

Morgan Stanley

Credit Suisse

Deutsche Bank

BNP Paribas

Bank of America

HSBC

2.2.2 Sovereign Wealth Funds

These are investment funds owned by national governments, rather than the big pools of privately owned capital in the section above. In the past, national public-sector pension schemes accumulated major reserves of investment capital. Many of these are now privatised, and the term Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) is mainly used for funds accumulated by commodity-exporting nations from their foreign currency income.

These SWFs have boomed in the last couple of decades, reflecting a global wealth shift away from the consumer economies of the “developed world”, now sunk in debt, to exporting nations such as China and the Gulf oil states. These states accumulate more foreign currency from commodity sales than they invest or distribute at home. The difference builds up into SWFs, which are then invested overseas to buy up companies, property, and other resources. For example, in London, the very visible sign of this is the takeover of the city’s skyline by glass towers like the Shard – just one item in the Qatari SWF’s property portfolio.

While the global investment funds above spread their assets over thousands of companies, the SWFs are often more focused – buying big chunks of particular companies, or massive infrastructure and real estate schemes.

See: SWF Institute website list of funds by AUM

NB: not in the list: not all the big SWFs have London offices. The second biggest, China Investment Corporation (CIC), with $940 billlion, does not. The third biggest, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (Adia), closed its London office in 2015.

Norges Bank / Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global (aka “Oil Fund”)

Norges Bank IM: Queensberry House, 3 Old Burlington Street, London, W1S 3AE

Source: https://www.nbim.no/en/organisation/our-offices/london-office/

Norway’s massive oil reserve fund, administered by the state-owned Norges Bank Investment Management. The biggest SWF with just under $1.1 trillion in assets under management (AUM). It acts much like the big investment funds above – similar to BlackRock or Vanguard, it owns shares in almost all the world’s big listed companies. Although, with Norway’s social democratic record, Norges Bank’s investments have long been a contentious issue: and campaigns over the years have succeeded in getting it to divest from many arms manufacturers, coal miners, gold miners, and others. It still invests in many of the companies on this map, however.

Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA)

Wren House, 15 Carter Lane, London, EC4V 5EY

Source: https://kia.gov.kw/contact-us/

Controls $592 billion of assets. Its London division, called Kuwait Investment Office (KIO), makes investments across Europe and beyond. This, in turn, has a subsidiary infrastructure fund called Wren House (after its HQ). Wren House’s portfolio includes Britain’s biggest port operator ABP, London City Airport, and North Sea Midstream Partners, which controls a “major chunk of North Sea energy infrastructure” in Scotland.

Temasek Holdings

23 King Street, London, SW1Y 6QY

Source: https://www.temasek.com.sg/en/contact-us

Singaporean SWF with $375 billion to spend. It has its European base in London. Temasek’s portfolio includes worldwide investments in oil and other energy companies, agribusiness and life sciences, industrials and transport, real estate, and more.

Qatar Investment Authority (QIA)

Qatari Diar: 16 Grosvenor Street, London, W1K 4QF

Source: http://www.qataridiar.com/english/pages/contact-us.aspx

QIA is a major investor in many of the companies on our primary list. It is one of the biggest investors in mining giant Glencore, oil supermajor Total, French motorways and infrastructure giant Vinci, and many more. It also has large holdings in a number of global banks, notably Barclays. QIA plays a particularly important role for us as a major property owner in London. It owns 20% of Heathrow Airport, and a majority stake in the Canary Wharf Development Company – London’s biggest landlord, which owns the effectively privatised financial district. Some of its property is held through a subsidiary called Qatari Diar, a real estate investment fund which has bought further swathes of London from the Shard to the former Olympic Village.

2.2.3 Private Equity

Most investment capital is used by the big funds to buy shares in listed companies (“PLCs”), which are publicly traded on stock exchanges. Private equity firms, on the other hand, specialise in buying shares in companies through private deals. This can mean, for example, investing “venture capital” in start-up or smaller companies, or “buy-outs” to take over established firms. These funds are often secretive, with much less published information than for the giant fund managers above.

Private equity firms are typically smaller than the massive general investment funds – though the biggest ones will still control many billions of dollars. Here are the top five globally, plus a few other major ones (ranking from Private Equity International, based on capital raised over last 5 years.) See also 2.4.3 below for smaller specialist funds.

London is one of the world centres of the Private Equity industry. The big US firms all have offices in London, and are joined by many locally run funds which often focus on Europe, or “emerging” markets including Africa and the Midde East. While the big banks and general investors typically work from glass skyscrapers in the City and Canary Wharf, the private equity houses go for more discrete townhouses, often in Mayfair.

Blackstone Group

40 Berkeley Square, London, W1J 5AL

Source: https://www.blackstone.com/the-firm/our-offices

The world’s biggest private equity fund, according to PEI international. Headquartered in New York, it owns numerous well and less known companies and hotel chains. (NB: don’t confuse with BlackRock.) CEO Schwarzman is a major backer and adviser of President Trump. Its real estate division is infamous for its role in evictions and gentrification of cities, and has been targeted by resistance from Athens to Barcelona. Its Brazilian firms have been identified as “significantly responsible for the ongoing destruction of the Amazon rainforest”.

Carlyle Group

1 St James’s Market, London, SW1Y 4AH

Source: https://www.carlyle.com/contact-us/worldwide-offices

US-based. World’s second biggest PE fund, according to PEI international rankings. Perhaps best known for its links to the Bush and Bin Laden families. It is one of the owners of Neptune Oil, a fast-growing oil company active in the North Sea, Africa and South-East Asia.

KKR (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts)

Stirling Square, 7 Carlton Gardens, London, SW1Y 5AD
Source: https://www.kkr.com/our-firm/locations

US private equity fund, the world’s third biggest according to PEI international rankings. Infamous for its “asset-stripping” company buyouts in the 1980s and 90s. Its investment focuses include oil and gas companies and related infrastructure and real estate. Recently announced a major investment in the British Columbia Coastal GasLink pipeline which is being vigorously resisted by Wetʼsuwetʼen first nations people.

CVC Capital Partners

111 Strand, London, WC2R 0AG

Source: https://www.cvc.com/offices

The biggest UK-based PE fund, and the world’s fourth biggest, according to PEI international rankings. Its many investments across Europe, Asia and Americas include the UK’s biggest oil pipeline, and North sea oil company Neptune.

Warburg Pincus

Almack House, 28 King Street, London, SW1Y 6QW

Source: https://www.warburgpincus.com/london/

US based. World’s fifth biggest PE fund, according to PEI international rankings.

Bain Capital

Devonshire House, Mayfair Place, London, W1J 8AJ

Source: https://www.baincapital.com/locations

Founded by former US vice-presi d ent Mitt Romney (with other partners), known for its political links and for buying out and asset-stripping companies. World’s sixth biggest PE fund, according to PEI international rankings.

Oaktree Capital Management

Verde, 10 Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5DH

Source: https://www.oaktreecapital.com/contact-us

Major global private equity and investment fund, controls over $100 billion of capital. It is notorious as the world’s biggest “distressed debt” or “vulture” fund – buying up the assets of crisis-hit countries and companies, then chasing them for repayment. It was a major profiteer from the European debt crisis, and recently involved in court cases to chase the debt of Puerto Rico. It also runs a $2 billion energy fund investing in oil tankers and more.

3i Group PLC

16 Palace Street, London, SW1E 5JD

Source: https://www.3i.com/site-tools/contacts/

One of the few private equity firms whose shares are traded publicly as a PLC. 3i is London based and is a member of the FTSE 100. Its investment focuses include energy and infrastructure.

2.2.4 Hedge Funds

“Hedge fund” is the label often given to more specialised or “alternative” investment funds. The term is pretty loose nowadays, and includes funds with a range of different strategies. Some main types include: “quant” funds which use computer algorithms to gamble on commodity prices or derivatives; “equity funds” which both buy and “short” shares, betting that the share price will fall; and “debt funds” which specialise in buying up or betting on the debts of companies and governments.

One group with particular notoriety are the “vulture funds” or “distressed debt” investors. These buy up the debts of countries hit by crisis and poverty on the cheap,, then do all they can to make a profit – for example, by chasing countries through the courts to seize their assets.

Although usually much smaller than the big “mainstream” investment funds, hedge funds can play an important role at the frontiers of capitalism. They often lead in creating new products and markets – finding ways to monetise and trade ever more of the world’s resources for profit. For example, as the climate crisis escalates, hedge funds find ways to profit by gambling on future oil and other commodity prices, carbon trading schemes, or even on “weather derivatives” and “catastrophe bonds”.

London is one of the main global centres for the hedge fund industry. Like the private equity funds, many tend to be clustered around Mayfair and the West End. In this section we list some of the biggest general hedge funds, where these all work on energy and other earth-wrecking sectors amongst other areas.

A list of hedge funds by Assets Under Management

A list of hedge funds with London operations

A “top 50” ranking

Man Group PLC

Riverbank House, 2 Swan Lane, London, EC4R 3AD

Source: https://www.man.com/contact

The world’s largest publicly traded hedge fund, and the biggest based in the UK. Its multiple funds gamble on pretty much anything from “natural catastrophe bonds” to real estate. It sponsors the Man Booker literature prize and an Oxford University research centre.

Brevan Howard

55 Baker Street, London, W1U 8EW
Source: https://www.brevanhoward.com/

One of Europe’s biggest hedge funds. It makes short term bets on commodities such as oil and metals prices, as well as currencies and more. Officially registered in Jersey and Cayman Islands tax havens. Sponsors financial analysis centre at Imperial College London.

Monarch Alternative Capital

1st Floor, 50-52 Welbeck Street, London, W1G 9HL

Source: http://www.monarchlp.com/contact/

US-based vulture fund which specialises in buying and chasing “distressed debt”. Involved in court case to chase debts from crisis-hit Puerto Rico. Another string to its bow is investing in coal: “In February 2017, it became the principal shareholder in Arch Coal, the second largest supplier of coal to power companies in the U.S. Arch Coal has been accused by United Mine Workers of America of conspiring with Peabody Energy in a scheme to default on $1.3 billion in retiree pension and healthcare obligations.”

Autonomy Capital

110 Bishopsgate, Floor 34, London, EC2N 4AY UK

Source: https://www.autonomycapital.com/contact/

US based hedge fund that is reportedly a big gambler on European carbon emissions. It is also known as a vulture fund speculating on debts of “emerging countries”. Involved in court case to chase debts from crisis-hit Puerto Rico.

Point72

8 St James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4JU

Source: https://www.point72.com/contact-us/

Global hedge fund of US billionaire Steven Cohen. Point72 is the successor to Cohen’s previous business SAC Capital Advisors, which closed down after being hit by a $1.8 billion fine for insider trading. It includes a fund specialising in energy investments.

Winton Capital

Grove House, 27 Hammersmith Grove, London, W6 0NE

Source: https://www.winton.com/contact-us

One of the biggest London -based hedge funds, a “quant fund” which uses maths-heavy data analysis and computer algorithms to speculate on commodities across the world. The associated David and Claudia Harding Foundation has given £100 million to Cambridge University.

Lansdowne Partners

15 Davies Street, London, W1K 3AG

Source: https://www.lansdownepartners.com/contact-us/

“One of London’s oldest and most secretive hedge funds”, according to the Financial Times. It is perhaps best known for betting on the collapse of Northern Rock during the financial crash, and also has an energy fund speculating on oil and other commodity prices. Current press statements say it is betting against oil and on renewables – but it will follow wherever the money leads.

Elliott Advisors

116 Park Street, London, W1K 6AF

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/02989338

Source: https://register.fca.org.uk/ShPo_FirmDetailsPage?id=001b000000MfUxEAAV

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Infamous as a “vulture fund” which buys up and chases “distressed debt”. In particular, Elliott played a major role in suing the Argentinian and Peruvian governments for bond payments during the Latin American debt crisis. Other recent investments include buying football club AC Milan. Owned by Republican-backing US billionaire Paul Singer; the London office is run by his son Gordon. It also owns Waterstones, currently in dispute with its workers over the living wage.

GAM

8 Finsbury Circus, London, EC2M 7GB

Source: https://www.gam.com/en/our-company/about-us

Swiss hedge fund mainly involved in gambling on bond markets, also has funds investing in energy companies.

Sculptor Capital

40 Argyll Street, 2nd Floor, London, W1F 7EB
Source: https://www.sculptor.com/about-sculptor/offices/london

Formerly called Och-Ziff, Sculptor is a global hedge fund founded by US billionaire Daniel Och. It is notorious for a 2016 corruption scandal where Och and his fund were accused by the US courts of paying over $100 million in bribesto secure natural resources deals in Libya, Nigeria, Guinea and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

2.2.5 Smaller earth-wrecking specialist investors

This section lists smaller investment companies – including private equity, hedge funds, traders, and other “boutiques” – which specialise in energy, mining, and other primary earth-wrecking sectors.

Kerogen Capital

6th Floor, 50 Pall Mall, London, SW1Y 5JH

Source: http://www.kerogencap.com/contact-us/

Private equity investor specialising in oil and gas companies, with bases in Hong Kong and London. Major investor in North Sea oil companies, and in Energean, the UK-Greek-Israeli company drilling wells and building pipelines in the Eastern Mediterranean.

EIG Global Energy Partners

20 St. James’s Street, 7th Floor, London, SW1A 1ES

Source: https://www.eigpartners.com/locations/london-uk

Specialist fund investing in oil and gas, pipelines, and “alternative energy”. Has $32 billion invested in 355 portfolio companies including a Brazil-Bolivia gas pipeline, coal and oilsands in Canada, biomass in Spain, and numerous oil drillers from Alaska to Africa.

NB: EIG also has a joint-venture subsidiary fund called Harbour Energy, jointly owned with Hong Kong’s Noble Group. This is based at the same address.

Red Kite Capital

1 Bartholomew Lane, London, EC2N 2AX

Source: https://www.rkminefinance.com/#contactSection

Specialised metal and mining investment fund run by former Conservative party treasurer, and evangelical Christian, Lord Michael Farmer – called “Mr Copper” for his exalted position in the copper trading business. Its RK Mine Finance fund has lent money to numerous metals and mining companies. Also in the business is Farmer’s son George, who has headed the UK branch of US rightwing propaganda organisation Turning Point.

Orion Resource Partners

33 Welbeck St, London, W1G 8EX

Source: https://www.orionresourcepartners.com/orion-mine-finance

Specialist metals and mining investment fund. Was previously part of Red Kite, spun off under its chief Oskar Lewinowski. Has invested in numerous mining companies including Dalradian.

Riverstone

3 St James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4JU
Source: https://www.riverstonellc.com/#!contact/london-office

Private equity firm focused on energy companies, with nearly $39 billion of investments in companies worldwide. Investments include coal, oil drilling, biofuels, and much more. Invests in UK fracking firm Cuadrilla.

First Reserve

7th Floor, 25 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0EX

Source: https://www.firstreserve.com/contact

US-based global private equity firm focused purely on energy companies. Its portfolio includes numerous oil and gas ventures worldwide.

Northlander Commodities

Shearwater House, 21 The Green, Richmond, London TW9 1PX

Source: http://www.northlander-advisors.com/

A “UK fund with strong ties to the US”, specialised in energy trading. Reported to have “made as much as $125 million” by speculating on global heating through trading carbon emission credits.

Andurand Capital Management

100 Brompton Road, London, SW3 1ER

Source: http://www.andurandcapital.com/contact.html

London-based oil and energy trading hedge fund run by Pierre Andurand.

Appian Capital

5th Floor, 45 Pall Mall, London, SW1Y 5JG

Source: https://appiancapitaladvisory.com/contact/

London-based private equity fund which invests solely in metals and mining.

Global Natural Resources Investments (GNRI)

4^th Floor, 14 Curzon Street, London, W1J 5HN

Source: https://gnri.com/

Private equity firm with offices in London and Doha, invests in oil, gas and mining. Was a former unit of Barclays Bank bought out by its managers in 2015.

Arkesden Partners

7 Birchin Lane, London, EC3V 9BW

Source: https://www.arkesden.com/contact

Investment advisory and private equity firm working on oil, mining and other energy deals.

Helios Investment Partners

2nd floor, 12 Charles II Street, London, SW1Y 4QU

Source: https://www.heliosinvestment.com/our-investments/private-equity#list

London-based private equity firm set up to deal in Africa, including investments in African oil companies.

Commodities Traders

Mandara Energy

6 Broad Street Place, London, EC2M 7JH

Source: http://www.mandaracapital.com/#subpage-3

Specialist energy derivatives trader – i.e., makes bets for clients on oil and other energy prices. Bases in London, New York and Singapore.

OTC Europe LLP

5th floor, 10 Finsbury Square, London, EC2A 1AF

Source: http://www.otcgh.com/portfolio-of-companies/otc-europe/

Trading firm “specializing in over-the-counter energy physical and financial futures and options, including crude oil, gas oil, fuel, freight, and middle distillates”.

BB Energy

BB House, 12-14 Ansdell Street, London, W8 5BN

Source: http://www.bbenergy.com /contact /

Describes itself as “one of the world’s leading independent energy trading companies” and “one of the most active gasoil, gasoline, bitumen and fuel oil traders in the Mediterranean.”

NB other important companies not in London:

Bridgewater Associates, Renaissance Technologies, are the world’s two largest hedge funds by assets managed, neither have London offices. Nor does EnCap, a major oil and gas private equity fund.

2.3 Insurance companies

The insurance industry is a crucial cog in the earth-wrecking machine. Ecocide is a risky venture. Mines or wells fail to produce, ships sink. “Accidents” are a regular occurrence – involving not just loss of capital, but potentially multi-million dollar lawsuits and compensation payouts to the families of those maimed and killed. Governments may come under enough political pressure that they are forced to tighten regulations or even end exploitative contracts.

These risks are all just part of doing business. But one or two major incidents could sink an earth-wrecking company – if it wasn’t for the insurance industry. Insurers “pool risk”: collect premiums from all their customers to create large funds, which then pay out to those who get unlucky.

What this means is that major earth-wrecking schemes – e.g., a new oil well or coal mine – can’t even get started unless the operator has an insurance contract in place. And this creates a very significant point of “leverage” for those trying to resist.

For example, resistance to coal has pushed many big insurers to make statements about withdrawing from coal insurance. Looking at the small print, these statements are often pretty weak: e.g., Axa’s much heralded statement only talks about phasing out insurance to very big coal miners by 2040. Even so, this pressure is pushing up coal insurance premiums, so making it more and more expensive for miners to start new schemes. That is: campaigning against insurance companies is already stopping at least some new coal mines being dug.

London is one of the world’s great insurance marketplaces, arguably the birthplace of the modern commercial insurance system. Lloyds of London began as a coffee house meeting place where ship owners would hook up with rich “names” who would underwrite their colonial trading ventures. London’s insurance scene is still based around the current home of Lloyds, in the east of the City.

For more on coal insurance see: Unfriend Coal website from Greenpeace and others.

Allianz

60 Gracechurch Street, London, EC3V 0HR

Source: https://www.agcs.allianz.com/global-offices/united-kingdom.html

Mega German-based insurance and financial services conglomerate: its fund management subsidiary Pimco features separately on this map. It is one of the world’s largest insurance businesses overall, and works with companies in all sectors including the onshore and offshore oil and gas industry.

American International Group (AIG)

The AIG Building, 58 Fenchurch Street, London, EC3M 4AB

Source: https://www.aig.co.uk/contact-aig-uk

Massive US-based global insurance giant, infamously bailed out by the US government in the 2008 crash. It is the largest industrial insurer in the US, providing cover for the majority of big US industrial corporations, amongst many others. Its UK Energy division provides mining insurance, oil rig insurance, chemical and pharmaceutical insurance, and more. In January 2020, AIG confirmed that it will continue to insure coal, with CEO Brian Duperreault saying coal is “being taken out of the ground because people need it”.

Axa UK PLC

5 Old Broad Street, London, EC2N 1AD

Source: https://www.axa.co.uk/about/addresses/

Major French-based multinational insurance firm. Provides insurance to onshore and offshore energy companies, including major oil companies. In November 2019 Axa announced that it would stop insuring companies which produce more than 20 million tonnes of coal per year … but only by 2030 for European companies, and 2040 for the rest.

Lloyds of London

1 Lime Street, London, EC3M 7HA

Source: https://www.lloyds.com/contact-us

Lloyds is not an insurance company itself, but rather an insurance marketplace. It is made up of numerous members, who come together in 90 plus “syndicates” to offer insurance cover. Lloyds’ historical roots are in marine insurance, and the shipping and energy industries are still important parts of the business. Lloyds says it does not have uniform underwriting policies because of its syndicate structure. According to “Unfriend Coal”, this means Lloyds is becoming the last place in Europe where coal miners can insure new mines.

Aon PLC

The Aon Centre, The Leadenhall Building, 122 Leadenhall Street, London, EC3V 4AN

Source: https://www.aon.com/unitedkingdom/contact-us.jsp

London-based insurance brokerage. Its energy and mining division works with all parts of the oil and gas industry, as well as mining companies, on products from oil rig insurance to “political risk”.

Beazley PLC

Plantation Place South, 60 Great Tower Street, London, EC3R 5AD

Source: https://www.beazley.com/contact_us.html

Specialist group of London insurers, a participant in the Lloyds insurance marketplace. Its energy division claims it insures over 30% of the world’s top 200 upstream and midstream oil and gas companies. Another of its specialisms is “political risk” insurance.

Chubb Ltd

The Chubb Building, 100 Leadenhall Street, London, EC3A 3BP

Source: https://www.chubb.com/uk-en/contact-us/locations.aspx

Chubb is a Swiss-headquartered global insurer which claims to be “the world’s largest publicly traded property and casualty insurer”, and a “leading supplier” to the energy industry. It provides cover to downstream/onshore and upstream/offshore fossil fuels companies.

Lockton

The St Botolph Building, 138 Houndsditch, London, EC3A 7AG

Source: https://www.lockton.com/offices/uk

US insurance broker, one of the world’s biggest. It insures companies across the oil and gas supply chain. It claims to work with over 20 major midstream companies, in-process liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities, and offshore Gulf of Mexico facilities.

Owners: still controlled by the founding Lockton family.

RFIB Group

12th Floor, 30 St Mary Axe, London, EC3A 8BF

Source: https://rfib.com/contact-us/

London-based specialist insurer. The energy division has offices in London, Bermuda, Dubai and Singapore. It claims to have “a portfolio of clients ranging from State owned energy companies through to independents” and “expert knowledge of exploration and development phases of oil and gas”.

Miller Insurance

70 Mark Lane , London, EC3R 7NQ

Source: https://www.miller-insurance.com/Contact/London

Miller works with companies in the upstream, midstream and downstream phases of fossil fuel production, in the renewable energy sector, and on major energy infrastructure construction projects.

QBE Insurance

Plantation Place, 30 Fenchurch Street, London, EC3M 3BD

Source: https://qbeeurope.com/contact-us/

QBE says it has been supporting companies in the oil and gas sector for more than 30 years, including many of the world’s largest international and national oil companies, drilling contractors and service companies.

2.4 Other finance sector institutions

2.4.1 Auditors: the Big 4 accountancy firms

Company law requires companies’ financial accounts to be audited, checked by accountants who are certified and regulated by official bodies. The UK Register of Auditors shows 5649 firms listed. But only four really matter.

The “Big Four” are: Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG, and Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC). In the UK, they audited the accounts of every single FTSE 100 company in 2019, and 227 of the FTSE 250 (the 250 next biggest UK listed companies). In the US, their dominance is not quite so complete: they audited just over 50% of the biggest 3000 companies in 2018. As well as being by far the biggest accountancy firms in the world, the Big 4 also branch out into a range of other “consultancy” services to the business world.

There is endless debate about the need to regulate the accountancy market “cartel”, without much happening. The auditors have an incentive to sign off accounts without asking any awkward questions, in order to win not just more auditing contracts but other lucrative consultancy work.

All the Big 4 firms have been the subject of multiple scandals, collusion allegations, fraud and money-laundering inquiries, etc., which sometimes lead to prosecutions and fines. These are far too numerous to list here: web search and you’ll find plenty.

Technically, the Big 4 are not in fact companies, but “professional services networks” involving multiple local partners. This further inoculates them from legal come-back by scattering liability amongst the partner firms.

Deloitte

Main office: 1-3 New Street Square, London, EC4A 3HQ

Also: Hill House, 1 Little New Street, London, EC4A 3TR;

Buckley Building, 49 Clerkenwell Green, London, EC1R 0EB;

Source: https://www2.deloitte.com/uk/en/footerlinks/office-locator.html

KPMG

Main office: 15 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5GL

Source: https://home.kpmg/uk/en/home/about/offices.html

PricewaterhouseCooper (PWC)

Main office: 1 Embankment Place, London, WC2N 6RH

Other office: 7 More London, Riverside, London, SE1 2RT

Source: https://www.pwc.co.uk/who-we-are/regional-sites/london/offices.html

Ernst & Young (EY)

Main office: 1 More Place, London, SE1 2AF

Also: 25 Churchill Place, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5EY;

Tower Bridge Court, 226 Tower Bridge Road, London, SE1 2UP;

6 More London Place, London, SE1 2DA

154-164 Fleet Street, London, EC4A 2DQ;

15 Adam Street, London, WC2N 6AH;

55-57 Rivington Street, London, EC2A 3QA

Source: https://www.ey.com/en_gl/locations/united-kingdom

2.4.2 The Rating Agencies

As well as selling shares or borrowing from banks, big companies raise finance by issuing bonds. Bonds are basically “IOUs”, debts written on bits of paper (or nowadays, electronic data) which can be sold and traded between investors, paying interest to whoever holds them.

The interest rates that companies (or governments, or anyone else) have to pay depends on their credit ratings. The more a company is seen as high-risk (i.e., likely to go bust and not pay its debts), the higher interest it has to pay.

Who sets the credit ratings for companies, governments, and other major institutions? Worldwide, there are just three main “ratings agencies” whose ratings are followed by investors. These are Moodys, Standard & Poors, and Fitch.

As with the Big 4 accountants, there is ongoing debate about “cartelling” and collusion in the ratings industry. A fundamental flaw in the system is that the rating agencies are basically paid on commission by the same companies and banks they analyse. Calls for reform were particularly strong following the 2008 crash, when the three agencies were criticised for giving good ratings to the banks’ “securitised” sub-prime mortgage bonds (and others) that then blew up. Needless to say, nothing much has changed since then.

The rating agencies have real power to shape markets. For example, cutting a rating below “investment grade” automatically triggers sell-off by many big investment funds. For a country’s debt (“sovereign” bonds), this can trigger a national economic crisis. And for a big oil or coal infrastructure scheme that needs to raise debt finance, having a good rating could be almost as important as getting insurance in place.

The three main global rating agencies are all US-based. All have London offices, which are often the main bases for their analysts working on Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

S&P
The Mcgraw-Hill Building, 20 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5LH
Source: https://www.spglobal.com/en/contact-us/office-locations

Moodys

1Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5FA

Source: www.moodys.com/Pages/contactus.aspx

Owners: PLC. The biggest shareholder is Berkshire Hathaway Inc. 13.07% (Warren Buffet’s investment fund), after that the usual big funds such as Vanguard, BlackRock, State St.

Fitch Ratings
30 North Colonnade, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5GN

Source: www.fitchratings.com/site/about/contact

Owners: Hearst Corporation.

2.4.3 Exchanges

Back in the day, financial exchanges were big rooms full of shouty men in bowler hats or braces waving bits of paper. Nowadays they are more likely to be computerised “virtual” marketplaces where artificial intelligence algorithms are pushing out the coke-heads.

Still, for now most of the big exchanges do have physical locations, and many of these are still in the City. The London, Stock Exchange (LSE) is the best known, trading shares in UK publicly listed companies (PLCs). But London is also home to other specialist exchanges, including some of the world’s biggest marketplaces for trading “commodities” such as oil and metals, as well as the new world of carbon emissions trading.

London Stock Exchange (LSE)

10 Paternoster Square, London, EC4M 7LS

Source: https://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/global/contact-us/contact-us.html

London Metal Exchange (LME)

10 Finsbury Square, London, EC2A 1AJ

Source: https://www.lme.com/en-GB/About/Contact-us/Offices

The LME is the world’s largest market for trading futures and options contracts concerning base and other metals, including non-ferrous, steel, cobalt and precious metals. The LME’s “responsible sourcing rules” do not require companies to take into account environmental and climate risks in their supply chains.

ICE Futures Europe

5th Floor, Milton Gate, 60 Chiswell Street, London, EC1Y 4SA

Source: https://www.intercontinentalexchange.com/about/offices

The main European exchange for trading futures, option, and other standard derivatives contracts. Products traded here include commodities and energy derivatives, such as futures and options contracts on oil, gas, coal, and “soft” agricultural commodities. ICE Futures Europe says it is “home to 50% of the world’s crude and refined oil futures trading”. It is also now the “world’s leading market for emissions trading”. It trades futures contracts for EU carbon allowances and Kyoto protocol “certified emissions reductions” (CERs). (The previous European Climate Exchange (ECX) was bought out by ICE and merged into the main exchange.)

Owners: formerly LIFFE (London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange), it is now the European part of the international derivatives market owned by Intercontinental Exchanges (ICE), based in the US.

London Bullion Market Association (LBMA)

1-2 Royal Exchange Buildings, Royal Exchange, London, EC3V 3LF.

Source: http://www.lbma.org.uk/contact

Members of the LBMA, mostly international banks and bullion dealers and refiners, trade futures contracts on precious metals in over-the-counter (rather than exchange) deals.

London Clearing House (LCH)

Aldgate House, Aldgate High Street, London, EC3N 1EA, UK

Source: https://www.lch.com/contact-us

A key back office part of the financial markets infrastructure, a clearing house organises the actual payment and exchange of securities after deals are made on the various exchanges, as well as for more bespoke “over the counter” (OTC) deals. LCH is one of the biggest in the global markets.

CTX (Carbon Trade Exchange)

2nd Floor, Berkeley Square House, Berkeley Square, Mayfair, London, W1J 6BD

Source: https://ctxglobal.com/

UK and Australia based company which runs an electronic exchange for trading voluntary carbon offset credits.

2.5 Law firms

Capitalism can’t function without lawyers to draw up contracts, defend property rights – and give “rule of law” cover to the repression of those who challenge it. Brutal earth-wrecking corporations, in particular, have well-paid lawyers on call to justify their land grabs and defend them when “accidents” or human rights violations come to light. The firms in this list are just a few of the most notorious specialists in this area of corporate law.

Note: law firms are generally limited partnerships owned by the senior lawyers who work for them.

Gibson Dunn & Crutcher

Telephone House, 2-4 Temple Avenue, London, EC4Y 0HB

Source: https://www.gibsondunn.com/office/london/

Multinational US firm that prides itself on its work with the oil and gas industries. Its ‘environmental tort’ department specialises in defending companies against mass action claims for breaches of environmental laws. On its website, Gibson Dunn boasts a long list of examples, including representing a major food company: “in a series of toxic tort lawsuits involving thousands of Latin American workers claiming personal injuries from exposure to a chemical used on banana farms “. Another of its “success” stories is helping Chevron overturn a ruling in favour of 48 Ecuadorean plaintiffs who had sued the company over pollution from the Lago Agrio oil field.

Dentons

1 Fleet Place, London, EC4M 7RA
Source: www.dentons.com/en/global-presence/united-kingdom/london

Described as the largest law firm in the world thanks to the 10,000 lawyers it employs globally. Dentons advised on the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline s , which were eventually scrapped after intense opposition by indigenous people in Turtle Island (Canada). Dentons also defends corporations against class action suits, including those of an “aboriginal “ and “environmental “ nature. Indeed, the company has its very own specialist (anti) aboriginal law department. Clients include BASF, the government of India, and Centrica.

Latham & Watkins

99 Bishopsgate, London, EC2M 3XF
Source: https://www.lw.com/offices/london

US law firm whose clients include Shell, Exxon Mobil, and Chevron. Its record includes representing Shell in two sets of group actions brought by thousands of residents of the Bille and Ogale communities for extensive oil pollution in the Niger Delta.

Baker Botts (UK) LLP

41 Lothbury, London, EC2R 7HF

Source: https://www.bakerbotts.com/offices/london

Major US firm with a UK branch. Prides itself in its work with the energy secto r, including oil & gas, hydro power, LNG and unconventional fossil fuels. Clients includeBP, Gazprom, Petrogas and Qatar Petroleum.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer

65 Fleet Street, London, EC4Y 1HT

Source: https://www.freshfields.com/en-gb/contacts/contact-us/europe/london-office/

Multinational corporate law firm headquartered in London. Established in 1743, Freshfields is the world’s oldest international law firm. It advises multinationals, including oil and gas firms, dealing with litigation on environmental and human rights grounds. Although it likes to keep details of the clients in specific cases a secret, other sources reveal that the company has successfully defended Europe’s biggest CO2 emitter, RWE, against a claim by a Peruvian mountain guide for the company’s contribution to the effects of climate change on his community.

White & Case LLP

5 Old Broad Street, London, EC2N 1DW

Source: www.whitecase.com/locations/emea/london

US corporate law firm with offices in London. Clients include Energean, Saudi Aramco, Eni and Total.

Allen & Overy

One Bishops Square, London, E1 6AD

Source: www.allenovery.com/en-gb/global/global_coverage/europe/united-kingdom

Major international corporate law firm whose clients include oil and gas companies. Worked on the Trans Adriatic gas Pipeline (‘TAP’) and the Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan & India gas pipeline (TAPI).

Linklaters

1 Silk Street, London, EC2Y 8HQ

Source: https://www.linklaters.com/en/locations/united-kingdom

Multinational corporate law firm. Clients include ExxonMobil, Eni, BP, Total, Gazprom, and Rosneft. Has advised Rosneft on oil concessions in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Pinsent Masons

30 Crown Place, Earl Street, London, EC2A 4ES

Source: www.pinsentmasons.com/locations/europe/united-kingdom/london?pageNumber=1

Major international law firm specialising in work with the energy sector, among others. Has reportedly offered its services to companies seeking anti-fracking protest injunctions. Clients include BP, Shell and Total.

Norton Rose Fulbright

3 More London, Riverside, London, SE1 2AQ

Source: www.nortonrosefulbright.com/en-gb/locations/london

Another huge international law firm, with a specialism in defending multinationals against so-called “toxic tort” cases. These include “mass disaster and catastrophic events”, such as class action lawsuits by communities affected by groundwater contamination, and workers subjected to chemical exposure . Clients include BP, Exxon Mobil and Shell.

Clifford Chance

10 Upper Bank Street, London, E14 5JJ

Source: https://www.cliffordchance.com/people_and_places/offices/london.html

Another corporate law firm, whose long list of clients include Shell, Total, Engie, Equinor, Kuwait National Petroleum, Soco International, Sinopec, SOCAR, Trans Adriatic Pipeline, Offshore Drilling Holding S.A., Nord Stream and Chrysaor.

Slaughter and May

1 Bunhill Row, London, EC1Y 8YY

Source: https://www.slaughterandmay.com/where-we-work/offices/london//#officelocation

Major corporate law firm which has worked extensively with oil, gas and mining companies. Clients include INEOS, Shell, Repsol and Premier Oil.

2.6 Military and security

The military industrial complex is one of the most polluting industries on earth. The U.S. Department of Defense is responsible for more hazardous waste than the five largest U.S. chemical companies combined. It has littered its former war zones with toxic cocktails of depleted uranium, oil, jet fuel, pesticides, defoliants like Agent Orange, lead, and other contaminants. War itself is also a major CO2 emitter: in 2005, the UK military was responsible for approximately 5 million tonnes of CO2, which was then roughly equivalent to the total emissions of Senegal. In the same year, the estimate for the US military was 60 million tonnes.

But aside from its own direct earth-wrecking, the military plays a further central role in planetary capitalist devastation. It is the enforcement arm of the system, called out to use terror and lethal force wherever profits need defending from people resisting the corporations. And wherever there are new markets to be “opened” through colonisation and regime change.

Still drawing on its imperial history, London is one of the main global centres of the war industry. It is home to some of the world’s largest arms manufacturers and dealers. And it is a key hub for mercenary contractors – the Private Military and Security Companies, or PMSCs – which often have close ties to the British armed forces and the local officer class.

For arms companies see: Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) list

Unsurprisingly the mercenary industry is pretty secretive. Here we just name a few better-known examples of bigger and more public-facing companies. Here are some recent reports on the UK industry with more information:

War on Want: Mercenaries Unleashed (2016)

Action on Armed Violence: Britain’s private military and security industry examined (December 2018)

2.6.1. Arms manufacturers

BAE Systems

4th Floor, Blue Fin Building, 110 Southwark Street, London, SE1 0TA

Source: https://www.baesystems.com/en/cybersecurity/careers/our-locations/uk-and-europe/london

The world’s fourth largest arms company. Combat aircraft, warships, tanks, armoured vehicles, artillery, missiles, small arms ammunition, cyber & intelligence, and nuclear missile submarines. 14% of BAE’s total sales are to Saudi Arabia, 42% to the US.

See also: C ampaign A gainst A rms T rade page.

Owners: PLC. Owned by major investment funds.

Boeing

Boeing Defence UK: 25 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0EX

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/01290439

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

The second largest arms company in the world. Produces the Apache attack helicopter, which has been used in military operations in countries including Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.

See also: C ampaign A gainst A rms T rade page.

Owners: US PLC.

Northrop Grumman

Clareville House, Oxendon Street, London, SW1Y 4EL

Source: https://www.northropgrumman.com/careers/job-search-united-kingdom/

The fifth-largest arms company in the world. Northrop Grumman manufactures combat aircraft such as the ground-attack A-10 and the B-2 Spirit “stealth” bomber. It also produces a wide range of military drones.

See also: C ampaign A gainst A rms T rade page.

Owners: US PLC.

Leonardo (formerly Finmeccanica)

8-10 Great George St, London, SW1P 3AE

Source: https://www.uk.leonardocompany.com/en/contact-us

Products include military helicopters, fighter aircraft, drones, missiles, radar and targetting systems, naval guns, artillery and armoured combat vehicles.

See also: C ampaign A gainst A rms T rade page.

Owners: Italian PLC, listed on Milan stock exchange.

Rolls Royce

Kings Place, 90 York Way, London, N1 9FX

Source: https://www.rolls-royce.com/contact-us/rolls-royce-headquarters.aspx

Produces military aircraft engines, naval engines and cores for nuclear submarines.

2.6.2 PSMCs (Mercenaries and security firms)

“The 2003 Iraq War saw the most significant use of PMSCs to date. While exact figures are difficult to come by, it is said that during the 1991 Gulf War the ratio of troops to contractors was approximately ten to one, in 2007 during the Iraq War, the ratio was roughly one to one …”

G4S

5th Floor, Southside, 105 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 6QT
Source: www.g4s.com/en-gb/site-tools/contact-us

(NB: G4S shares this building with offices of the NHS. Its head office is near Crawley.)

The second largest private security company in the world, G4S does everything from transporting cash to running private prisons. Just one part of the business is running mercenaries in war-torn countries, particularly in the Middle East and East Africa. The British government has employed G4S mercenaries in Afghanistan and Yemen, and G4S operates a subsidiary in Sudan. Oil and mining companies are other regular clients. According to War on Want: “G4S, whose clients include Royal Dutch Shell and AngloGold Ashanti, is known to be targeting the natural resources sector.”

See also: 2018 Corporate Watch company profile.

Aegis

2 London Bridge, London, SE1 9RA

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/04541965

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Aegis Defence Services is a mercenary firm involved with the NGO, aerospace, and government and diplomatic sectors, as well as the oil, gas and mining industries. According to War on Want (from 2016): “Aegis Defence Services boasts that the company’s ‘largest area of business is Iraq’, and that it ‘has been operating in support of the oil and gas sector for over two years’”. Some s candals include footage emerging of soldiers apparently firing at civilians in Iraq, and the use of former child soldiers from Sierra Leone.

Control Risks

Cottons Centre, Cottons Lane, London, SE1 2QG

Source: https://www.controlrisks.com/contact-us/office-search/london

Control Risks describes itself as an “international professional services and consulting firm” – others have described it as a mercenary outfit. It has worked securing company oil assets in Iraq, and has also played an active role in Libya.

Corps Security

Market House, 85 Cowcross St, London, EC1M 6PF

Source: https://www.corpssecurity.co.uk/contact/office-locations/

Formerly known as the Corps of Commissionaires, Corps Security is a British security company that officially reports to Queen Elizabeth II, with a team of about 3,000 security personnel and a dozen offices throughout the U.K. It specialises in “corporate security” – including event protection, electronic surveillance, and consulting.

Serco

4th Floor, 100 Victoria Street, London, SW1E 5JL

Source: https://www.serco.com/about/office-locations

Serco is a UK-based outsourcing firm that does basically anything governments want to outsource, from locking up migrants to cleaning offices. Security is one of the most lucrative parts of the business. According to the defence section of its website, “We currently service 70+ military contracts with the Military of Defence (MoD).We operate in Maritime, Aviation, Space &Security and Nuclear & Complex Infrastructure.”

2.7 Government

One line of political propaganda presents state and markets as antagonists: corporations and speculators are tearing up the world in their rampant greed, and only strong government can hold them back. (Or, in the right-wing mirror version, government holds back the great progressive force of the free market.)

In fact, the state is ecocidal capitalism’s intimate partner. Government plays a number of roles that are all essential to the machine. Here are some, with a few examples of UK government units:

Military: sending in gunboats or mercenaries to “open” new markets for corporations and investors (Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces, Foreign Office, Intelligence Services).

Law-enforcement: maintaining a stable property system where companies’ ownership rights are respected (Police, judiciary, security services).
Financial: funding infrastructure that isn’t profitable enough for the private sector, bailing out banks and companies when they screw up, etc. (Treasury, Bank of England, other departments through public spending and procurement).
Deal-making: negotiating and acting as a representative for businesses to foreign states, etc. (Foreign Office, Department of International Trade, Department for International Development, ..)
Regulatory: providing rules and supervision for markets, adjudicating disputes between companies, etc. (Treasury, Bank of England, Financial Conduct Authority, Department for Business, ..)
Ideological: providing a national education system and other measures to ensure citizens learn how to be good worker-consumers (Department of Education, Department of Culture, ..).

See: our book on Capitalism for more on all this.

There are numerous government locations in central London. We haven’t included them on the map because they are already well known, and easy to find.

Wikipedia list of central government departments with addresses

Metropolitan Police stations and City of London Police stations

3. Ideology industry

“We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.” Ursula Le Guin

The people killing the earth are the powerful: political and business leaders armed with the economic might of trillion dollar investment funds and the lethal force of police and armies.

But they can’t do it without widespread consent. They need the active participation of millions of accomplices: managers, bureaucrats, engineers, mercenaries, cops, and many others, who run the earth-wrecking machine and crush resistance. And they need at least passive acceptance from billions more of us: whether we also dream of getting a piece of the action, or we just can’t see any way out.

But capitalism isn’t natural or inevitable. It’s just a peculiarly destructive social system made by some human beings over the last few hundred years. To keep going it needs to keep us believing, to continually “manufacture” our consent.

The ideology industry is what we’re calling the organisations and networks dedicated to this. Their job is both creative and critical. On the one hand: keep pumping us with beliefs, values and desires that fuel the consumption and growth machine. On the other: undermine any alternative visions.

The ideology they weave goes very deep, with multiple layers. Some key ones:

Domination: core beliefs separating humans from “nature” and asserting our power over the natural world – and, hand in hand, the separation and domination of some humans over others. This ideological strand goes back maybe some 5,000 years to the origins of “civilisation” and the first states.
Capitalism: humans are “economic agents” driven by greed or self-interest; private property and markets are natural and sacred; happiness is consumer goods and financial status; economic growth is the number one political imperative. These ideas have been fighting their way to power over a few hundred years.
Green capitalism: now the ecological devastation caused by capitalism becomes obvious, the ideology industry needs to go into overdrive spinning new stories. It’s not enough just to keep pushing consumer products and the growth fantasy. They also need to reassure us the status quo can solve ecological crises with technofixes and transition fuels – just keep calm and carry on.

The ideology industry feeds us these ideas again and again. Some of its main channels are:

Education system: even in infant school we can start learning about government authority, private property, business success. Higher education trains the machine’s managers, and the teachers who pass on its values to the next generation.
Media and culture industries: TV, movies, drivetime radio, newspapers, social media pump out a million more variants on the same messages, repackaged and repeated with the latest issues, consumer trends or celebrity gossip.
Politics: parliamentary politics is a theatre where our “leaders” identify and bicker over the issues of the day – Brexit, Megxit, immigrant hordes … so long as it isn’t capitalism killing the planet. Politicians and media work together in a symbiotic clinch, feeding each other stories and attention.

The companies and investors listed in Parts 1 and 2 influence us through all of these channels. They feed them with ideas and stories they want to promote. They also influence what ideas and stories get trashed, buried, or just ignored.

Business feeds the education system with sponsorships and endowments, employment partnerships, academy chains, etc.
Business feeds media and culture industries with advertising, investment, press releases and “off the record” sources, targeted PR operations.
Business feeds the politicians with lobbying and donations, and by setting up think tanks that develop ideas and agendas.
Business also feeds all of these through more informal social networking. Company bosses, financiers, politicians, media moguls, movie producers, editors and commentators, top academics or think tank pundits, etc., all mingle together at conferences, board meetings, dinners, charity events, villa holidays, members’ clubs, old school reunions, and so on.

The organisations identified in the next sections are just some of the most visible players in this web. We start with two of the main channels used to spread ideology: London-based (higher) education institutions; and the more powerful or more right wing media organisations. Then we look at some organisations that help companies influence these: PR firms, lobby groups, and think tanks, as well as more specialist greenwashing initiatives.

3.1 Universities

London’s university quarter sits at the centre of the map, midway between the financial hub of the City and the seat of government in Whitehall. From the start the University of London has been a key player in the development of modern capitalism and its ideology. Its first institution, University College, was set up in the 1820s with the support of London businessmen and an agenda of promoting the liberal and free market ideas of the new capitalist ruling class – as against the aristocratic old regime represented by Oxford and Cambridge.

Throughout this history, London University has been financed and directed by local and global capital. Businesses shape its development through grants and partnerships, or by sponsoring specific chairs, scholarships, and whole research units focusing on their subjects of interest. Specialist units promoting greenwashing and green capitalism are just one new twist on this.

Imperial College

Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2AZ

Source: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/visit/campuses/south-kensington/

Imperial College is London’s prestige university institution specialising in science and engineering. Imperial is making some serious contributions to greenwashing including dedicated research units promoting “Clean fossil and bioenergy” and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technologies. The latter works closely with the oil industry and the Global CCS Institute thinktank, which is linked to direct from Imperial’s website.

UCL (University College London)

Main address: Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT

ISR, Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment: 22 Gordon St, Bloomsbury, London WC1H 0QB

UCL campus map: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/maps

The UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources, funded by major earth killers including BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, Tata Steel, HSBC and KPMG is a major source of greenwashing. BHP Billiton’s contribution of at least $5 million caused particular controversy.

LSE (London School of Economics and Political Science)

LSE main address: Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE

GRI: Floor 11, Pethick-Lawrence House (Formerly Tower 3), Clement’s Inn, London WC2A 2AZ

Campus map: https://www.lse.ac.uk/lse-information/Campus-Map

Its main green capitalism initiative is the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, which works on areas such as carbon pricing, transition economics and “green Growth”. Sponsors include dam-builder Statkraft. (This is the twin of the science-focused Grantham Institute at Imperial College; both are funded by investment fund manager Jeremy Grantham). LSE’s other corporate “global partners” are major banks, investment funds, and Big 4 accountancy firms.

Kings College

Main address: Strand, London WC2R 2LS

Source: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/

Its Thomas Young Centre – an alliance with UCL, Imperial and Queen Mary’s Colleges – is an engineering research centre working on computer simulations in collaboration with companies including BP and Rio Tinto. The £6 million Rio Tinto partnership studies rock fragmentation techniques to develop “the mine of the future”.

SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies)

Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square London WC1H 0XG

Source: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/contacts/

Houses the Brunei Art Gallery, endowed by the Sultan of Brunei, one of the planet’s biggest oil profiteers.

3.2 Media

3.2.1 Social media platforms

Google

1-13 St Giles High St, London, WC2H 8AG

6 Pancras Square, London, N1C 4AG

Belgrave House, 76 Buckingham Palace Road, London, SW1W 9TQ

Source: https://about.google/intl/en-GB/locations/?region=europe

(NB: due to relocate to new Kings Cross “lowscraper” campus in next few years.)

They know everything about you and soon they will own the world.

Facebook

1 Rathbone Square, Fitzrovia, London, W1T 1FB

https://www.facebook.com/facebooklondon/

Data-harvesting giants.

3.2.2 TV and radio

BBC

Broadcasting House: Portland Place, London W1A 1AA

The official broadcaster of the UK mainstream. BBC bosses have said they will no longer give climate change deniers the prominence they once did, but the corporation continues to uncritically report the activities and impact of the companies on this map through much of its news coverage.

ITV

2 Waterhouse Square, 138 – 142 Holborn, London EC1N 2AE

Source: https://www.itvstudios.com/contact

Free to view TV network. One of the very few major UK media companies that is owned by a publicly traded company, ITV PLC.

Sky Media

10th Floor Nova South, 160 Victoria Street, London SW1E 5LB

Source: www.skymedia.co.uk/contact/

The UK’s largest pay TV broadcaster. Owned by Comcast, mega US TV corporation, which is largely owned by the Roberts Family.

3.2.3 Newspapers (and news websites)

News UK

1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF

Source: www.news.co.uk/contact-us/

The “baby shard” building next to London Bridge station houses the UK division of Rupert Murdoch’s global News Corp media empire, including the offices of The Sun and The Times. Murdoch’s Fox Corporation TV network are notorious climate change deniers.

Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT)

Northcliffe House, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT

Source: https://www.dmgt.com/about-us/locations-and-contacts

HQ of the Daily Mail and Metro papers and their online outlets. The Metro, a free tabloid, is now regarded as the UK’s most widely read paper. The parent company DMGT is listed on the London Stock Exchange, but a majority stake is retained by hereditary owner and chairman Lord Rothermere. The Mail particularly gives space to the rants and fantasies of climate change deniers.

Daily Express

One Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London E14 5AP

Source: https://www.express.co.uk/about-us/amp#contact-us

Right wing migrant-bashing and climate change-denying rag. Trinity Mirror group bought the Express from longtine owner Richard Desmond in 2018, without changing the paper’s winning formula.

Evening Standard

ESI Media: 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT

Source: https://www.standard.co.uk/service/contact-evening-standard-7185764.html

London free newspaper edited by former chancellor George Osborne. It is majority owned by Russian oligarch’s son and socialite Evgeny Lebedev, whose family made their fortune from investments and natural gas, among other things. A minority share is owned by DMGT (see above), and it has offices in the Daily Mail building.

The Telegraph

111 Buckingham Palace Road, London SW1W 0DT
Source: corporate.telegraph.co.uk/contact-us/

The Torygraph. Owned by the Barclay Brothers. Has been regularly criticised for featuring climate deniers in its pages.

The Spectator

22 Old Queen St, Westminster, London SW1H 9HP
Source: www.spectator.co.uk/about/

Conservative mag once edited by Boris Johnson. Another publication owned by the Barclay Brothers, who also own the Telegraph. Has been accused of providing “a ready platform for proponents of climate change denial”.

3.3 Trade associations and Lobby groups

Free market capitalist ideology often stresses competition. But capitalism also relies on companies working together to defend their common interests. The companies in our map have created numerous alliances and associations to do this. One main role of these trade associations is coordinating messaging and PR campaigns across the industry. Another is acting as industry representatives to lobby politicians.

GENERAL BUSINESS ASSOCIATIONS

Confederation of British Industry

Cannon Place, 78 Cannon Street, London, EC4N 6HN
Source: www.cbi.org.uk/help/contact-us/

The biggest lobbyists for business in Britain, calling itself “the voice for business”. The CBI has 190,000 company members and employs “100+ economic and policy specialists, the largest policy unit outside Whitehall”. It also organises hundreds of networking events across the country each year.

Institute of Directors

116 Pall Mall, London, SW1Y 5ED
Source: www.iod.com/about/contact-us

A 30,000+ membership organisation for company bosses established in 1903. The IoD provides training and advice to its members, and organises networking opportunities. It has published reports sponsored by Cuadrilla.

TheCityUk

Fitzwilliam House, 10 St Mary Axe, London, EC3A 8BF
Source: www.thecityuk.com/contact/

Campaigning body for London (and other UK) banks and investment funds – “Britain’s most powerful financial lobby group”. Its chair is also chairman of HSBC. Seeks to influence policy at national and international levels. Also holds many networking events.

ENERGY SECTOR

Energy UK

1st Floor, 26 Finsbury Square, London, EC2A 1DS

Source: https://www.energy-uk.org.uk/contact-us.html

A trade association for over 100 suppliers, generators and “stakeholders” across the UK energy industry. M embers include Drax, RWE, Shell and many other companies on our map.

Energy Institute

61 New Cavendish Street, London, W1G 7AR

Source: https://www.energyinst.org/contact

Formed by the merger of the Institute of Petroleum and Institute of Energy in 2003, the Energy Institute is a membership association for around 20,000 engineers and other professionals representing 200 companies working in the fossil fuel and renewable energy industries.

Energy Networks Association

4 More London, Riverside, London, SE1 2AU

Source: http://www.energynetworks.org/info/find-us/contact-us.html

Formed in 2003, the Energy Networks Association represents the UK and Ireland’s transmission and distribution network operators in gas and electricity. Its members include the National Grid and Scottish Power.

AGRICULTURE

National Farmers’ Union (NFU)

18 Smith Square, Westminster, London, SW1P 3HZ

Source: https://www.nfuonline.com/about-us/our-offices/external-affairs-westminster/

British Meat Processors Association

17 Clerkenwell Green, London, EC1R 0DP

Source: https://britishmeatindustry.org/about/contact-us/

CHEMICAL

Chemical Industries Association (CIA)

Kings Buildings, Smith Square, London, SW1P 3JJ

Source: https://www.cia.org.uk/

The CIA represents UK chemicals and pharmaceutical companies at a national and international level, including manufacturers and importers/exporters.

NUCLEAR

Nuclear Industry Association

5^th Floor, Tower House, 10 Southampton Street, London, WC2E 7HA

Source: https://www.niauk.org/contact/

The NIA is the trade association for the UK’s civil nuclear industry, representing over 260 companies across the supply chain. The chief executive, Tom Greatrex, is an advocate for expanding the UK nuclear industry through a new and cheaper investment mechanism.

World Nuclear Association (WNA)

Tower House, 10 Southampton Street, London, WC2E 7HA

Source: https://www.world-nuclear.org/

Based in the same building as the UK’s Nuclear Industry Association, the WNA is an international organisation, with over 170 members, promoting nuclear power and the companies that provide it.

FOSSIL FUEL

The Geological Society

Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, W1J 0BG
Source: www.geolsoc.org.uk/about

Huge membership organisation of geologists, and promoters of fossil fuels. Specialist divisions such as the Petroleum Group, Mineral Deposits Studies Group, and Engineering Group help unsustainable development go ahead with the rubber stamp of a respected body of scientists.

Petroleum Exploration Society of Great Britain

3rd Floor, Welby House, 96 Wilton Road, London, SW1V 1DW
Source: www.pesgb.org.uk/contact/

Membership organisation for scientists working in the oil and gas industry. The organisation convenes networking opportunities and lectures.

UK Petroleum Industry Association Limited (UKPIA)

37-39 High Holborn, London, WC1V 6AA

Source: https://www.ukpia.com/site-tools/contact-us/

The UKPIA represents and advises the UK downstream oil sector: the eight oil refining and marketing companies that operate the six major oil refineries in the UK. These include fossil fuel giants BP, Exxon Mobil, Shell and Total.

Oil and Gas UK (OGUK)

6th Floor East, Portland House, Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5BH

Source: https://oilandgasuk.co.uk/about-us/contactus

While the UKPIA represents the UK downstream oil sector, OGUK represents the offshore (or upstream) oil and gas industry. Its membership comprises around 400 organisations, from fossil fuel giants like Shell and BP to auditors such as Deloitte, and other companies supporting the fossil fuel economy.

Society of International Gas Tankers and Terminal Operators (SIGTTO)

42 New Broad Street, London, EC2M 1JD

Source: https://www.sigtto.org/contact/

Has over 170 members representing the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry. Along with shipping and logistics companies, its members include fossil fuel giants BP, Exxon Mobil, Shell and Total.

World Coal Association (WCA)

5th Floor Heddon House, 149-151 Regent Street, London, W1B 4JD

Source: https://www.ctc-n.org/network/network-members/world-coal-association (not available on WCA website)

Lobbying and membership association for the global coal industry. Purports to address environmental concerns by advocating for “high efficiency, low emission” (HELE) coal and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies. Its members include Glencore and other mining giants.

MINING

International Council of Mining and Metals (ICMM)

35/38 Portman Square, London, W1H 6LR

Source: https://www.icmm.com/en-gb/footer/contact-us

The ICMM supports extractivist capitalism and pays lip service to environmental concerns. It has a membership of 27 international mining and minerals giants, including BHP, Glencore, Lonmin, RioTinto and others high up on our map.

RENEWABLE, ALTERNATIVE AND TECHNOFIX

Renewable Energy Association (REA)

80 Strand, London, WC2R 0DT

Source: https://www.r-e-a.net/about-us/contact-us/

Represents companies across the renewable energy industry including the biogas, biomass and hydropower industries – and massive carbon emitters such as Drax and RWE. Its members directory has useful information on the different companies active in the sector.

Anaerobic Digestion and Bioresources Association (ADBA)

Sustainable Bankside II, 25 Lavington Street, London, SE1 ONZ

Source: http://adbioresources.org/contact

The ADBA was established in 2009 to lobby for the removal of barriers to the anaerobic digestion and biogas industry in the UK, and soon widened its remit to include all emergent biofuels. It has over 400 members from across the industry.

Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA)

6th Floor, 10 Dean Farrar Street, London, SW1H 0DX

Source: http://www.ccsassociation.org/about-us/contact-us/

Promotes the use of techno-fix Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technologies. Its members include BP, Shell, Total, Wood and other companies on our map.

Global Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Institute

Evergreen House North, Grafton Place, London, NW1 2DX

Source: https://www.globalccsinstitute.com/contact/

The Global CCS Institute describes itself as the world’s leading international thinktank whose aim is to promote techno-fix Carbon Capture and Storage (CCUS). Members including BP, BHP, Exxon Mobil, Shell and other massive emitters.

ENERGY AND CLIMATE TRADING

Climate Markets and Investment Association (CMIA)

100 New Bridge Street, London, EC4V 6JA

Source: https://www.cmia.net/contact/

The CMIA’s mission is to shift private and public investment towards markets that meet the long-term, gradualist objectives of the Paris Agreement, inadequate to tackling climate change. It has Active Private Sector Observer (APSO) status over some of the largest and most influential global climate funds, usually funded by governments to finance “climate mitigation and adaptation activities” in emerging markets.

London Energy Brokers’ Association (LEBA)

Warnford Court, 29 Throgmorton Street, London, EC2N 2AT

Source: https://www.leba.org.uk/contact/

LEBA represents broking firms active in the energy industry, and provides support to the industry generally in the areas of regulation and legislation.

3.5 Think tanks

“Think tanks” or “policy institutes” are idea incubators – organisations set up to develop and promote ideas and policies in the service of a particular agenda. They tend to work more behind the scenes: seeking to influence politicians and get stories in the news, but without becoming the story themselves. They promote world views from social democracy to far-right crankery – but given that most are funded by corporations and rich investors, the majority are pushing versions of environmentally-destructive free market capitalism.

Though there are prominent examples going back to the 19^th century and before, the big think tank boom started from the 1950s, spreading from the US. Joe Overton, an employee of one right-wing US think tank in the 1990s, came up with a classic model of their work. The point is that politicians rarely set the agenda themselves – they just choose policies which they think will win votes, within a range of options acceptable to mainstream public opinion. It is the think tanks’ job to shift this “Overton window” of what is politically acceptable, so setting the stage on which politics takes place.

Chatham House (aka Royal Institute of International Affairs)

10 St James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4LE

Source: https://www.chathamhouse.org/about/contact

Venerable British institution dating back to 1920. Calls itself “independent”, meaning the middle ground of the establishment elite – two of its three presidents are former Conservative PM John Major, and former Labour treasurer Alastair Darling. Famous for off-the-record briefings held under unattributable “Chatham House Rules”. Hosts more than 300 events a year. Promotes green capitalism and business-led “transition” through its Energy, Environment and Resources research programme, including events starring earth-wrecking company bosses and greenwashing academics. Some of its biggest funding comes from oil majors: Chevron and Shell each gave over £250,000 last year; and ExxonMobil, BP, Glencore over £100,000 apiece.

Institute of Economic Affairs

2 Lord North Street (entrance on Great Peter Street), London, SW1P 3LB
Source: iea.org.uk/contact-us/

A highly influential, hardcore free market think tank that has spent decades attempting to undermine consensus on climate change. One of a number of think tanks set up by Anthony Fisher, Old Etonian battery chicken farm millionaire and right-wing think tank impressario par excellence. Receives funding from corporations including BP.

Adam Smith Institute

23 Great Smith Street, London, SW1P 3DJ
Source: www.adamsmith.org/

Another major neoliberal (self-proclaimed) think tank co-founded by Anthony Fisher. Its policy proposals have been taken up by governments since Thatcher. It has also railed against renewables and greenbelts. Reveals very little about its funding.

Centre for Policy Studies

57 Tufton Street, London, SW1P 3QL
Source: www.cps.org.uk/about/contact-us/

Pro-free market, Tory-supporting think tank co-founded by Margaret Thatcher. Climate change sceptics and v ocal advocates of fracking.

Global Warming Policy Foundation

55 Tufton Street, London, SW1P 3QL
Source: www.thegwpf.org/contact-2/

Climate change denial lobby group founded by former Conservative chancellor Nigel Lawson. The GWPF actively fights against efforts to mitigate climate change, as well as advocating for the fracking industry, pushing back against recycling, and claiming that ‘polar bears are thriving’. One of the GWPF’s leading advisers was exposed in an undercover sting for offering to write an academic paper casting doubt on climate change on behalf of an oil company, and promoting C02 as a ‘benefi t, not a pollutant’.

NB: one of a number of right-wing thinktanks which share the same building owned by defence industry businessman Richard Smith. See report on 55 Tufton Street by DesmogUK.

European Foundation

55 Tufton Street, London, SW1P 3QL
europeanfoundation.org/about/

Eurosceptics and climate change deniers, strongly oppose action against climate change and consider it a ‘bandwagon’. Now appears to be primarily the mouthpiece of its founder (Sir) Bill Cash, Tory MP for Stone.

NB: one of a number of right-wing thinktanks which share the same building owned by defence industry businessman Richard Smith. See report on 55 Tufton Street by DesmogUK.

Civitas

First Floor, 55 Tufton Street, London, SW1P 3QL
Source: www.civitas.org.uk/contact-us/

Centre-right, pro-business think tank that has promoted nuclear, coal and fracking. Civitas also produce educational materials, including fact sheets on ‘family and marriage’ aimed at PSHE lessons, which it claims are used in hundreds of UK secondary schools. The organisation also runs supplementary schools for young children. Director David Green built his career at the IEA before moving to Civitas. Civitas has receiv ed funding from Murdoch’s News International group.

NB: one of a number of right-wing thinktanks which share the same building owned by defence industry businessman Richard Smith. See report on 55 Tufton Street by DesmogUK.

Policy Exchange

8-10 Great George Street, London, SW1P 3AE
Source: policyexchange.org.uk/contact-us/

Influential conservative think tank whose ideas have been implemented by successive governments. Advocate market ‘solutions’ and technofixes to climate change, including nuclear.

Initiative for Free Trade

10 Buckingham Street, London, WC2N 6DF

Source: www.ifreetrade.org/contact

Trade-focused think tank founded by Tory MEP Daniel Hannan. True believers in trickle down theory. They claim to have “extensive networks within governments” and aim to “reach out to businesses and interest groups around the world, particularly in developing countries.”
Various former heads of state sit on the advisory board. Collaborates with right-wing US think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and Cato Institute, funded by arch-climate change deniers the Koch brothers.

Spiked Magazine

Wework Aldgate Tower, 2 Leman Street, London, E1 8FA

Source: https://www.spiked-online.com/

Climate change deniers & Greta Thunberg trolls. Once “Living Marxism”, before moving with the zeitgeist to dump trotskyism and become plain pro-establishment provocateurs. Have received significant sums of cash from alt-right-backing billionaires the Koch brothers.

3.5 PR firms

PR firms are trained experts in shaping our ideas and desires. Edward Bernays, the “father of public relations” who helped invent many of today’s PR techniques, frankly described his work as: “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses”. Companies, governments, and trade associations hire Bernays’ successors for specialist advice on how to push their agendas and sales. And they bring them in for emergency help to trash or bury negative stories.

See also: Spinwatch, following the UK lobbying and PR worlds since 2005.

Edelman UK

Southside, 105 Victoria St, London, SW1E 6QT

Source: https://www.edelman.co.uk/contact

UK branch of the most profitable PR company in the world. Big promoters of fracking, Edelman has also worked with TransCanada on the Keystone XL pipeline and organisations resisting action on climate change. It was at the centre of controversy in 2014-15 arising from this business line, and lost executives and significant clients as a result. In 2015, Edelman said it was abandoning all work for coal companies, climate change denial lobbyists and front groups. But it still does plenty for oil companies. Other clients include the European Gas Forum, Shell and Unilever.

Lexington Communications

The Connection, 198 High Holborn, London, WC1V 7BD

Source: http://lexcomm.co.uk/about

PR, lobbying, and ‘political intelligence’ firm. Has provided PR for the fracking industry, companies producing GM crops, and pro-biotech front groups.

See also: Spinwatch profile (March 2018).

Omnicom Group

Bankside 3, 90-100 Southwark Street, London, SE1 0SW

Source: https://www.omnicomgroup.com/contact-us/

Holding company and enormous global PR conglomerate. Owns a list of PR fims including: Ketchum, Kreab, GPLUS, Portland, Fleishman Hillard.

Newgate communications

Sky Light City Tower, 50 Basinghall Street, London, EC2V 5DE

Source: https://www.newgatecomms.com/contact-us

PR firm for energy companies, described by Spinwatch as a “longstanding fracking industry lobbyist”.

3.6 Greenwashing services

With the rise of environmental concern and regulation, polluting companies need to keep up compliance and a clean image. This creates new business niches for third parties who operate specialist PR schemes to help them do this. This section lists just a few examples of such greenwash entrepreneurs.

The Climate Group

2^nd Floor, Riverside Building, County Hall, Belvedere Rd, London, SE1 7PB

Source: https://www.theclimategroup.org/contact-us

An “international non-profit” that promotes greenwashing initiatives it calls “business actions”: e.g., its RE100 list of leading companies who “commit to using 100% renewable fuels” – by 2050. The corporates in this scheme turn out to include many names on our list. For example, banks and investment managers like AEG, Allianz, Citi, Goldman Sachs, or HSBC (to name just a few) who are amongst the world’s biggest funders of fossil fuels, plus world-class polluters like Tata and Unilever.

Environmental Defense Fund

1st Floor, Bank Chambers, 6 Borough High Street, London, SE1 9QQ

Source: https://www.edf.org/offices/europe

US charity with big business and government connections. Works on “partnership” schemes in which corporates help “solve” environmental problems and so present themselves as sustainability heroes: e.g., sending a project team to work with McDonalds and reduce its plastic waste. Has promoted the gas industry as a “transition fuel” away from coal.

Natural Capital Partners

167 Fleet St, Holborn, London, EC4A 2EA

Source: https://www.naturalcapitalpartners.com/contact-us

Carbon offsetting fixer. Helps polluting companies get “CarbonNeutral® certification” and hooks them up with emission offset schemes – e.g, planting trees, or “renewable energy certificates (RECs)” – so they can meet their sustainability targets.

Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI)

Suite 1, 3rd Floor 11-12 St. James’s Square, London, SW1Y 4LB

Source: https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/OC415130

NB: Registered address. This is a current official company address; but it is not confirmed that it is an operational site rather than just a “letterbox”.

Greenwash initiative set up by the world’s biggest oil and gas companies – both the nationals such as Saudi Aramco and the private sector supermajors. It includes both a lobbying policy wing and a $1+ billion fund to invest in “innovative startups to lower the carbon footprints of the energy and industrial sectors”. One of its main objectives is to “jumpstart” the Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) industry.

OCTOBER 2021 NOTE: This version of the directory is now out of date. For an updated version, see here

Table of Contents

2. The facilitators

3. Ideology industry

1. Primary planet-killers

1.1 Hydrocarbon majors

1.1.1 The national oil companies

1.1.2 The multinational “oil majors”

1.2 Hydrocarbons: smaller oil companies, frackers and UCG

1.2.1 Smaller “conventional” oil and gas companies

1.2.2 The frackers: “unconventional fossil fuels” specialists

1.3 Oil and gas services and shipping

1.3.1 Oilfield services

1.3.2 Liquefied Natural Gas

1.3.3 Oil shipping and gas pipelines

1.4 Non-fossil energy: nuclear, biomass, dams…

1.4.1 Nuclear

1.4.2 Biomass

1.4.3 Dams: hydropower companies

1.5 Mining: metals and minerals

1.6 Earth-killing infrastructure: engineering and construction

1.6.1 Energy conglomerates

1.6.2 International engineering and construction giants

1.6.3 UK big builders

1.6.4 Cement producers

1.7 Agribusiness

1.8 Plastics and other chemical polluters

2. Secondary planet-killers

2.1 Banks

2.1.1 China’s Big Four

2.1.2 Top 20 multinational investment banks

2.1.3 Multilateral development banks

2.1.4 Smaller specialist banks

2.2 Investment funds

2.2.1 Top 20 Institutional Investors

2.2.2 Sovereign Wealth Funds

2.2.3 Private Equity

2.2.4 Hedge Funds

2.2.5 Smaller earth-wrecking specialist investors

2.3 Insurance companies

2.4 Other finance sector institutions

2.4.1 Auditors: the Big 4 accountancy firms

2.4.2 The Rating Agencies

2.4.3 Exchanges

2.5 Law firms

2.6 Military and security

2.6.1. Arms manufacturers

2.6.2 PSMCs (Mercenaries and security firms)

2.7 Government

3. Ideology industry

3.1 Universities

3.2 Media

3.2.1 Social media platforms

3.2.2 TV and radio

3.2.3 Newspapers (and news websites)

3.3 Trade associations and Lobby groups

3.5 Think tanks

3.5 PR firms

3.6 Greenwashing services