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How can we prepare for a disrupted future? The growing frequency and variety of global disruptions raise the question of how communities can prepare.

The world teeters on the brink of economic disaster due to energy shortages caused by war. Key oil-producing nations are unable and unwilling to increase output, though prices are high. The solutions being proposed—renewable energy technologies—are coming on line, but not fast enough. Sound familiar?

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Pranav Jani: Welcome to another episode of Together We Rise: Solidarity Stories from Central Ohio. I’m so happy to have today on our show my good friend and comrade, Kristen Guptil-Godfrey.

Kristen Guptill-Godfrey, who uses they/them pronouns, is a revolutionary socialist and organizer currently living in Arizona on unceded Tohono O’odham and Yoeme ancestral and traditional lands. Kristen’s mom was born and raised in Columbus, and although Kristen moved a lot growing up, they consider Columbus home.

They got the opportunity to live in Columbus from 2016 to 2018, and during that time, they became a revolutionary socialist and joined their first political home. Kristen also worked as a social worker and supported queer and trans young people.

They are a member of the Tempest Collective and a PhD student at the University of Arizona. Kristen strives to organize and be part of a growing imperfect Left that’s rooted in solidarity and internationalism to fight back against the authoritarianism and liberal capitulation we’re currently facing. Their local work includes organizing on campus for Palestinian liberation and fighting back against the attacks on DEI.

Do you want to talk a little bit about the work you’re doing right now in Arizona and start us off there?

Kristen Guptill-Godfrey: Yeah, for sure. In Arizona, I have been a part of an amazing group of people who have been building a branch for the Tempest Collective. The Tempest Collective is a revolutionary socialist organization with about eight branches across the country. We have been building that branch in Tucson and developing spaces for people to come together and find community and talk about the things that are happening around us, and then together debating a way forward. I’ve been building that branch over the last two years.

And then, recently on campus at the University of Arizona, I was the director of LGBTQ affairs. Since Trump was elected, the University of Arizona has just completely given in to his racist policies and basically renamed all of the cultural resource centers here. They’re no longer called centers. The LGBTQ Center cannot be called LGBTQ. And then they laid off all the directors, including myself. So, through everything that happened with these attacks on DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion, some of us created an organization called UA Resist.

It’s a group of faculty, staff, students, and community members who are fighting for a liberatory campus. That includes Palestinian liberation, showing up for international students, and DEI. For example, tonight we’re facilitating an Organizing 101 training for students to come and learn the skills that it takes to develop relationships with people.

Also, Tempest is a part of the No Data Center Coalition. Amazon Web Services and the electric company here are creating a data center to store the cloud. And we know that cloud holds the data of people that then Amazon Web Services uses and sells to ICE.

We successfully won the first round. We convinced the city council to vote against it. It’s been nice to be a part of coalition like that. And, in a couple months, we’re going to start this political education series around data centers, what that means for environmental racism, imperialism, and attacks on indigenous people. It’s been fun to get a win. We don’t really get wins that often, so when you get a win you really gotta celebrate.

PJ: When you say you’re a revolutionary socialist, what do you mean by that?

KG: That’s a good question. I think it means, for me, is that the way out of this is revolution.

That the way out of this is masses of people recognizing, ordinary people recognizing, the power they have in themselves to act with other people. To get out of this mess—whatever it is, whatever we want to call it—this racism, this authoritarianism, this imperialism that we’re facing and that the Global South is facing, the only way out of that is through this revolutionary process. We have to take control of our future.

PJ: Thanks. People nowadays are either skittish about revolution or don’t know what it means when the right creates the meaning. Because revolution gets seen that way, how would you describe it for ordinary people who aren’t familiar with the far Left? What would revolution mean? What kind of change are you looking for?

KG: I think it means a change from the ground up. This doesn’t mean that reforms are not good. Sometimes there’s a battle between, do I fight for this reform or do I say, “Oh, that reform sucks. We’re going to be in the same place in ten years. Why not fight for something bigger?” I think reforms are important for revolution because really the end goal is learning how to trust other people and how to democratically make decisions together.

I can’t provide an answer for what revolution will look like, but I know it will only come if we know how to work together and trust each other in that process and make spaces easy for people to enter.

The only way that process can happen is if we win these reforms together and learn about how they work. Like in winning the no data center fight, the trust that was built between those comrades in those organizing rooms really is what we’re fighting for, those relationships.

I can’t provide an answer for what revolution will look like, but I know it will only come if we know how to work together and trust each other in that process and make spaces easy for people to enter.

Maybe next time, it’s not fighting back against a data center. Maybe it’s fighting back against something bigger. And your politics, they move left as you’re in struggle. As you’re winning various reforms, it makes it easier to tie the connections between data centers and the border, or data centers and Palestine.

It’s not just like revolution is this thing that’s in the future, but it’s the revolutionary insight that you must have that really carries disciplined hope along, like I have to be in this for the long haul, and we have to really create change from the ground up, because this isn’t working for masses of people. Like capitalism, the racism that upholds capitalism is not working for so many people—even when they think it’s working for them.

PJ: So as a revolutionary socialist, if you’re fighting for this no data coalition, if you’re fighting around DEI—and I’m really sorry that you and others lost your jobs— if we’re trying to hold our line on those things, that’s not inherently revolutionary. It’s the process of us ourselves taking charge of things. I wanted to ask you about your work in Columbus. What are some of the memories you have of that time and the things that stand out for you about those experiences here in Columbus?

KG: Oh my gosh, that period was so important for me. I met you during that time. When I moved to Columbus, it was like I had this radicalization period during the Black Lives Matter movement. I don’t know if others listening had the same experience, but you realize that stuff is really messed up, and that there are a few people in charge, and they are running everything. As an alienated person, as an isolated person, you find other things to blame.

I had moved to Columbus from the University of Tennessee. I got my master’s in social work, and I helped organize stuff there. But I didn’t know where to place my anger. I didn’t know who the enemy was, and I didn’t know who to trust. I think this is true for a lot of Black, Brown, and Indigenous folks.

So, I moved to Columbus angry. I saw a flyer in a coffee shop, and I think it said something about socialist politics. And so I went.

I went to the talk, and I thought, “Oh, wow, this is really answering a lot of questions for me.” Anybody can organize. But people need training, people need revolutionary love to be organizers. There needs to be a shared vision, and people need to feel like they’re a part of that vision. So, we would go to coffee shops, and we would talk about all of these issues and we would read things.

I remember reading Party and Class with you, and that was foundational for me. I remember one time we were at the coffee shop, and you just went through all of the [communist] internationals and what that meant for the internationalist Left. I’m like, my mind’s just being blown everywhere.

You were a good mentor because we were reading things together. But we also were in this moment of heightened struggle. I was also going to protests with you. We were actually seeing on the ground what the stuff we were reading meant. It was nice to be doing both of those things with you as a mentor in a socialist organization.

PJ: That’s an honor when you say mentor. But I think at the end of the day, you can’t be in an organization that claims to be grassroots if you’re not meeting new people who get what you’re saying from their own experience and their own knowledge. And for us to pair up like that, those were invigorating meetings for me. It was fantastic to be able to go from those study groups to stuff on the ground and have those discussions in person with people in the middle of a time when things were really intense, in the Black Lives Matter movement. It doesn’t matter how long people have been around the movement—we were all getting educated.

KG: It was exhilarating. It was a moment—when previously you just couldn’t say that the police are bad—and it was like this ideological shift that we really had to figure out and bring people with us. It’s like after the encampment movement on college campuses, just second-guessing Zionism is not weird anymore.

There are these moments in history when organizers really have to take the moment, to meet strangers and to connect their personal experiences to an analysis of what’s happening in a way that they can easily understand and easily grasp onto. Sometimes it’s tough. It’s a lifelong process.

PJ: In Columbus, you were also doing work with trans kids. What was that work like and what did you take from it?

KG: Even before I worked there, I started working in social work in the foster care system. I managed a group home for boys in foster care.

It was at that group home that I noticed that the state was sending me trans girls to put in this home with boys. And so it was in that moment that I recognized that these systems are not set up for queer and trans people.

After I got my master’s, I got to work at an after-school program in Columbus. It was the first time that I got to think about political education with young people. That job was the first time I identified as an educator. Of course, young people need safe spaces to be and find friendship, but it was also political. Assata Shakur had just died and I did Assata’s chant with a group of young people.

I got to talk to queer and trans young people about Assata and what that meant for our own liberation as trans people. When I was at that job, I was also reckoning with my own gender. It was also a personal experience. In reckoning with my gender, I was uplifted by 13-year-olds who told me, “You can do this.” I have a video on my phone and it’s facing downwards to not record the young people, but we did Assata’s chant together.

I still do that to this day when I’m in a room full of young people because it really does influence the space that you’re in.

PJ: In memory of Assata, we should do the chant right now. Maybe go back and forth.

KG: It is our duty to fight for our freedom.

PJ: It is our duty to win.

KG: We must love each other and support one another.

PJ: We have nothing to lose but our chains.

KG: Yeah.

PJ: Yeah.

KG: May she rest in paradise.

PJ: We have been talking about bringing together Black Lives Matter and systemic racism, police violence, questions of gender, and questions of trans kids. In the shift to broader politics, what are some of the things that made you ready for that shift—made you a person who, when things are happening in the world, when these questions come, you didn’t just, say, “Wow, there’s a lot that needs to change,” or, “We ought to do something.”

You took steps toward changing this. “I have to be part of the solution.” What were some of those things that drove you to that?

KG: I think becoming a socialist made me aware of things that I didn’t think of before, like the material analysis of Marxism and the class-consciousness that is so necessary. I was also in Columbus in one of my big kid jobs when I got to really think of myself as an exploited worker, as a social worker. I thought about what was required of me as a worker and being alienated in that workplace. And I remember being in an International Socialist Organization meeting asking that question about how workers are exploited. What does that look like for educators and social workers?

I was putting together those pieces, and then it became clear to me that everything was connected, like the paycheck I had or where I lived or the gentrified neighborhood that my grandma lives in Columbus, where now her house is worth $500,000 and white people are asking to buy her house. That’s all material things we can touch and feel. It made it clear that life doesn’t have to be this way, that, as a worker, as a Black worker, I deserve more. I understood racism. But to really confront racism as it plays out in your everyday life is for you as a working-class person.

PJ: So that resonated with things you already knew but also put them in a new light.

KG: There’s this assumption in mainstream society, and even in the history classes that we’re in, that things just get better.

You know how people say, “I can’t believe you said that word. It’s 2025.” Like things just get better. And people are even now, “How are they going after same-sex marriage? It’s 2025.” And it’s like no, this is a battle, and if we whatever we want to call ourselves, the Left, progressives, if we don’t join together and fight that battle, we lose.

What we’re seeing is this back and forth of winning and losing, and when we lose, we are not organized. We are not talking to each other. We are not bringing new people into the movement. The Marxist analysis of history convinced me that I have to play a role in that history, that I’m just not going to wake up tomorrow and Black liberation will come. I think I read somewhere that there are more Black men in prison now than were enslaved. It’s a real thing you can touch to know that things don’t just get better. We have to fight for the things that we deserve, and they’re not just going to come to us, and we can’t rely on anybody but ourselves and other ordinary people to make that happen.

This is a battle, and if we whatever we want to call ourselves, the Left, progressives, if we don’t join together and fight that battle, we lose. . . . We have to fight for the things that we deserve, and they’re not just going to come to us, and we can’t rely on anybody but ourselves and other ordinary people to make that happen.

PJ: You’ve seen not only in Ohio but everywhere, these attacks on trans rights that are actually attacks on trans people. It’s not even been abstract, like you can’t have this right. It’s been like, why do you exist.

KG: Exactly—the demonization of a whole group of people.

PJ: As a cisgender person, I’m in solidarity in the fight against that, but I don’t feel it in the same way that a trans person would feel it. I don’t want to ask an unfair question, but how do you look at this moment? How are you experiencing this moment? You’ve been through a lot of moments, in your life as an activist and as a person where you’ve said this is a really bad time. This is a really hard time. How does this time feel to you?

KG: It feels rough because it feels unorganized.

In different meetings that I’m in, whether it’s a big coalition meeting or whether it’s a small Tempest meeting, it’s hard to even think about strategies and tactics. It’s like a lot of bad things are happening to us, but there’s not necessarily thousands of people going into the streets.

So then as a revolutionary, as someone who knows that we need people in this, we need people to take action, I think that is what honestly scares me the most.

And I think Trump is really good at this. He was good at this his first time around, but putting so much on us so quickly. It’s like you learn about one thing, and then he throws something else at you, so it’s too hard to keep up. And I know people feel that way, but it just feels like we don’t have enough people on our side doing active things every day to fight back.

And that’s not to say that people are not active. People are. And they are really giving their all. But I think it’s when we are unorganized, it is easier for people to be hopeless and move away if they have that privilege, or to just hold their ground and to see where it’s going to go.

Even now, it’s hard to offer someone a vision, and I think that’s what Trump is good at. He gave people a wrong vision, but he did give people a vision and an answer to why they can’t afford groceries. An inaccurate one, but the U.S. is founded on racism and enslavement and genocide, so when you tell somebody, “You don’t live a good life because of immigrants,” it’s easy to understand that.

What is our vision, and how do we share that with other people? It feels different from the Black Lives Matter movement. There were some parts of it that were unorganized, but there just seemed to be this force of people into the streets. People saying, “I’m going to do something about it.” It might be unorganized, and it might be tactically strong with no strategy. But people were doing something. And now it feels like we need that pressure. And we saw some of that for Palestine, but even that has died down, especially in the U.S.

PJ: So there needs to be this revival of this sense of vision, I think that’s a good word. There are a lot of people fighting, and a lot of us have been very busy. But we are missing this sense of collectively are we going to take this on or not?

Even people say fascism is this. That’s fine. People can say whatever word they want. But what are we going to do? That’s the question—and are we going to do it together? It’s about solidarity. Different people are at the front lines of different kinds of attacks, and that’s undeniable. At the same time, we’re in this together. No individual group is going to liberate themselves. What does that look like for you? What does solidarity in practice look like for you? How do we get this diverse group of people, who share a lot but also have differences, together?

I’m not asking you for a formula, but what I’m asking you for, how do we do it? If you have it, you should share it. But what I’m asking is, what have some of your experiences have been of those moments of solidarity, experiencing it and organizing around it?

KG: I think a couple things. I think one is connecting struggles, and two is not just connecting struggles, but also—I’m trying to think of a way to phrase it. For cis people to care about trans folks, for example. Why would a cis person want to show up for trans folks? Let’s say you don’t have any trans family members, you don’t have any trans kids. You’ve just heard about them on the news, and now you’re trying to figure out which way to go. I think the way to do that is to think about your own struggles that you’re facing and then having this material analysis and asking, what will I lose if trans people keep losing rights?

I think we saw this coming when they got rid of Roe v. Wade, right? That is an attack on trans folks and cis women. But it’s tough to see that attack happen without a huge movement to fight back against it. Now we’re seeing the demonization of trans people. This attack on a person’s ability to have an autonomous body where they make decisions for themselves. And that should be the number one thing we’re all fighting for. And that has everything to do with cis men, right? Cis men oftentimes, I think, don’t have autonomy over their bodies in that you get to only be emotional and express a certain type of emotion in a certain setting, if any.

You’re judged for how you express yourself; you’re judged if you don’t express yourself the right way. So that has everything to do with trans rights. That has everything to do with the medical industry and what services that we can be provided with, whether it’s hormones or abortion rights. I think that’s one way in terms of thinking about how this affects me. I could go my whole life not meeting a trans person, let’s say, but what does that trans person’s experience have to do with me? And if I don’t show up for that trans person, my own material rights are going to be taken away.

I’m not going to have abortion rights, or I’m not going to be able to think differently about my masculinity. I think those two things are very connected. Like with the border—not being allowed to move your body where you need to, whether it’s for your family to live or because you want to go somewhere else. That is an issue of autonomy about what you can do for you and your family,

PJ: And then there is the kind of moral and ethical question to just stand up for people next to you.

KG: If people are moved in that way: I have to show up because it’s the right thing to do, I think that’s brilliant. But also, I think there is this insight that, if they lose their rights, they’re coming for me next. I think that is very real, and we have seen that play out in the last 15 or 20 years.

I think another piece of solidarity for me is letting people mess up. I was just listening to Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor giving a talk. And she was like, “What if during the Black Lives Matter movement, we didn’t expect people to already be abolitionists when they came into our meetings?”

What if we invited people to a meeting and a white working-class person comes who is not convinced that cops are bad, and says, “Sometimes my neighbors and I do call the cops because things happen”? And then sometimes what we saw in that moment was maybe cancel politics. Maybe, “Oh we’re not going to invite that person to the next meeting” instead of a holding organizing spaces that can actually be somewhere where you get your questions answered in a loving, comradely way to then move people to understand—like what I just explained for a cis man caring about trans people. That just can’t happen in your own home. That has to be in collectivity with someone else who’s also thinking about it.

Say you’re a teacher and it’s your first time hearing about a gender-neutral restroom in your school. The spaces that organizers create have to be where people can connect those struggles. Then solidarity can be material. But if we are expecting people to say a certain thing, or to be educated on this certain thing, I don’t know where adults are going to get educated on this thing. They’re coming to us, I hope. So when they come into our spaces that should be easily accessible.

They should say something wrong. And then we should meet them with love and care, and get them to abolitionist politics, not expecting someone to show up and completely understand Zionism, and completely understand a one-state solution, and completely understand Palestinian liberation.

How can we be the landing pad for people to recognize the material connections from themselves and a Palestinian in Gaza? We have to be doing that work.

I just heard David McNally say that the spaces that we’re in, they might not be revolutionary spaces, but if they are spaces where people are at, we must be there. And we don’t change our politics, but we create spaces to talk about things with other people and bring our revolutionary politics into that.

I know both you and I are at universities where people have many different ideas. But universities are also made up of poor people, of working-class people, of Black and Brown people, so we must be there. Then we have to offer a different vision of what the university could be like. We have to talk to people who maybe have not thought about a free education. Or about an LGBTQ center that will always be in existence, or no police on campus. We have to be in these spaces where people are to offer these different types of visions, to work with people, and to move each other. We have to be open to being shifted by other people that we’re meeting. I think that’s how the relationship has to work to be a true, honest, comradely relationship.

PJ: There are not thousands of people on the street. Because of all the repression, the movements themselves don’t look as big in that kind of climate. There are a lot of people who are on the fence, who aren’t exactly sure what their next step should be. What kind of thoughts or advice do you have for people on the fence right now who see a lot of atrocities but aren’t sure what they should do?

We have to be in these spaces where people are to offer these different types of visions, to work with people, and to move each other. We have to be open to being shifted by other people that we’re meeting. I think that’s how the relationship has to work to be a true, honest, comradely relationship.

KG: Really, I think all I can say is you can’t do it alone. And you have to do something. You have to act, but that action only means something, and you’re only provided with safety to act ifs you do it with other people. So that means understanding the community you’re in.

Who’s meeting where? What is the landscape of the city you’re in? Do you have a friend who is just as pissed off as you and you want to read this book about McCarthyism together? I’m sure all of us have a pissed off coworker or a pissed off sibling who’s also thinking about this stuff. It doesn’t have to be a meeting with 50 people. It can be getting with a couple of people and thinking about how things work and why they work the way they work and providing each other that space to ask those questions. If you hear of a protest, if you hear of a march, if you hear of a teach-in, go. And you will hopefully be met with kindness.

The role of an organizer is to ask, “You got a ride?” Or to send you an email with five resources because you had this one question that they remembered from two weeks ago. That’s the role of an organizer, to make it easier for people to think about their place in organizing, their place in this revolution.

There’s a place for everybody. But we have to do something, and we have to do it with other people.

Opinions expressed in signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the editors or the Tempest Collective. For more information, see “About Tempest Collective.”
Featured Image credit: Becker1999 and Pranav Jani; modified by Tempest.

The post We have to do something appeared first on Tempest.

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THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 4 OCTOBER 2026 SLF-2007-077 The Sakhalin Papers LXVII: From Protocol Toward a Joint Venture — Shell and Gazprom Neft Plan Expansion Across Western Siberia and Beyond Seven months after Shell and Gazprom signed their “Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation”, Shell chief executive Peter Voser and Gazprom Neft chief Alexander Dyukov signed basic terms for something more concrete: a possible new joint venture covering Western Siberia, other Russian regions and even “third countries”. The distinction matters. No new venture was actually created by the June 2011 document. Shell and Gazprom Neft agreed to study one. By September Alexey Miller and Voser were still discussing how it might be established. But the direction was unmistakable. Four years after Shell lost control of Sakhalin II, the company was attempting to turn its relationship with Gazprom into a platform for expansion far beyond Sakhalin.

Archive reference: SLF-2007-077
Collection: The Sakhalin Papers
Principal authenticated records: Royal Dutch Shell plc Annual Report and Form 20-F 2011; US Securities and Exchange Commission filing record; Gazprom corporate records concerning the 2010 Strategic Global Cooperation Protocol and the June 2011 Gazprom Neft–Shell agreement
Contemporaneous reporting: Gazprom Neft press-service material; Dow Jones; Russian business press; contemporaneous Donovan archive
Judicial context: Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin)
Evidence standard: The June 2011 agreement is described according to what it actually did: it established basic terms for examining the creation of a joint venture. It is not represented as proof that the contemplated venture had already been incorporated or that every proposed project proceeded. Corporate statements about technology, international assets and future cooperation are attributed to the companies making them. Commentary concerning strategic motives is identified as commentary.

Introduction

Yesterday’s file ended with a remarkable document.

On 30 November 2010 Shell and Gazprom signed a:

Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation.

Its reach was deliberately broad.

Western Siberia.

The Russian Far East.

European downstream markets.

And possible Gazprom participation in Shell projects outside Russia.

The language suggested ambition.

But a protocol is not a project.

It does not drill a well.

It does not transfer an asset.

It does not create a producing company.

The next question was therefore obvious:

Would Shell and Gazprom turn the rhetoric into corporate machinery?

By June 2011, the answer was beginning to emerge.

Not through Sakhalin Energy itself.

Through Gazprom’s oil subsidiary:

Gazprom Neft. 1. First came an April meeting

On 12 April 2011, Alexey Miller and Peter Voser met in Moscow.

The companies discussed implementation of the global strategic-cooperation protocol.

The agenda included possible joint projects in Western Siberia and eastern Russia, downstream cooperation in Russia and Europe, and Gazprom participation in Shell projects in third countries.

There was also an immediate Sakhalin issue.

Japan had suffered the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami of 11 March 2011, followed by the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

Contemporary reporting recorded that Gazprom and Shell discussed increasing LNG deliveries to Japan from Sakhalin II. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

The Sakhalin partnership therefore had two dimensions by spring 2011.

It was an operating LNG business.

And it was becoming the institutional foundation for something much larger.

2. 16 June 2011: Shell and Gazprom Neft sign the basic terms

Gazprom’s subsequent official corporate record dates the next major step to:

16 June 2011.

Gazprom Neft and Shell signed what Gazprom described as the:

Basic Terms and Conditions of the Agreement.

The parties would examine the possibility of creating a joint venture for projects in:

Western Siberia;

other Russian regions;

and:

“third countries.”

Gazprom repeated that description in later official releases, including its June 2012 account of continuing Shell cooperation. Gazprom

A contemporaneous Gazprom Neft press-service account carried by Russian business media described the same agreement and its intended geographical scope. BFM.ru – деловой портал

This was the bridge between the grand 2010 protocol and possible operating ventures.

3. A small but important correction: no new joint venture yet

The wording needs care.

Shell and Gazprom Neft did not announce on 16 June that a new joint venture had already been created.

They agreed to:

assess the potential of creating one.

The surviving English-language version of the announcement states that the companies would examine a joint venture to pursue projects inside and outside Russia.

Peter Voser described the agreement as a:

“launch pad for new joint projects”

in Russia and elsewhere.

Alexander Dyukov said working with Shell could give Gazprom Neft access to advanced technology and opportunities involving assets outside Russia. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

That distinction is central to this instalment.

The ambition was established.

The corporate vehicle was still being designed.

4. Western Siberia was not new territory for Shell

Shell was not entering Western Siberia for the first time.

It already had a substantial producing business there.

Shell and Gazprom Neft each held 50 per cent of the Salym development.

Shell’s 2011 Annual Report and Form 20-F records that Salym production averaged approximately:

165,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day

during 2011.

The same filing records Shell’s continuing 27.5 per cent interest in Sakhalin II. FinancialFilings

So the contemplated new joint venture was not an experiment between companies unfamiliar with one another.

There was already a working precedent.

Sakhalin II linked Shell with Gazprom.

Salym linked Shell with Gazprom Neft.

5. Salym provided a different model from Sakhalin

The contrast is worth making explicit.

At Sakhalin II, Shell had begun as the controlling shareholder and later became a minority partner after Gazprom acquired 50 per cent plus one share.

At Salym, Shell and Gazprom Neft were equal partners.

That meant Shell already possessed an example of Russian cooperation based on:

50–50 ownership.

The June proposal therefore did not simply extend the ownership structure imposed at Sakhalin II.

It pointed towards a different model:

equal partnership with the oil arm of Gazprom.

That was potentially much easier for Shell to present internally and externally as conventional commercial cooperation.

6. And Salym was producing at substantial scale

Shell’s SEC-filed 2011 annual report provides useful perspective.

Sakhalin II had reached planned plateau production of about:

360,000 boe per day

in 2010.

Its two LNG trains had been designed around approximately 9.6 million tonnes per annum, and Shell said optimisation increased production to:

10 million tonnes per annum

in 2011.

Salym, meanwhile, was producing approximately:

165,000 boe per day.

These were not marginal experimental assets.

Together they demonstrated that Shell’s Russian partnerships were already capable of producing hydrocarbons at material scale. FinancialFilings

The strategic-cooperation programme therefore rested on substantial operating experience.

7. Gazprom Neft said openly what it wanted from Shell

Alexander Dyukov’s statement accompanying the June agreement is unusually revealing.

Gazprom Neft wanted:

experience;

advanced technology;

and:

access to assets outside Russia.

That last element directly echoed the reciprocity principle discussed in yesterday’s file.

Gazprom’s senior management had already said that foreign companies obtaining access to Russian upstream projects should be prepared to offer access to attractive international opportunities in return.

The Gazprom Neft statement now expressed the same idea at operating-company level. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

Russia had the resource base.

Shell had international assets and technology.

The contemplated venture was intended to combine them.

8. Shell’s description was equally revealing

Voser did not describe the June agreement as damage limitation following Sakhalin.

He said it built upon the companies’:

“successful partnership”.

And he called it a potential:

“launch pad”

for projects in Russia and elsewhere. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

The choice of language matters.

Four and a half years earlier Shell had been fighting to retain control of its largest Russian investment.

Now its chief executive was treating the relationship that emerged from that confrontation as a base from which to expand.

That statement is corporate fact.

Why Shell regarded this as strategically sensible belongs partly to commentary.

But what Shell said publicly is unambiguous.

9. The proposed reach was deliberately wider than oil production

The agreement was not confined to drilling.

The contemporary Gazprom Neft press-service account said the companies wanted to develop cooperation across:

geological exploration;

production;

processing;

and:

marketing of hydrocarbons.

That meant the proposed partnership could span a substantial part of the oil and gas value chain. BFM.ru – деловой портал

Again, this closely reflected the November 2010 Global Strategic Cooperation Protocol.

The June agreement was beginning to give that framework an operating shape.

10. “Third countries” may be the most important phrase

Western Siberia was unsurprising.

Shell already operated there.

Other Russian regions were logical.

But the phrase:

“third countries”

deserves attention.

It meant the contemplated venture was not necessarily to be confined to Russia.

Gazprom Neft wanted the possibility of accompanying Shell into international assets.

That was a major conceptual shift from the early Sakhalin relationship.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, Shell had brought international capital and expertise into a Russian project.

By 2011, Russia’s state-controlled energy companies were seeking routes outward.

Shell could potentially provide them.

11. Shell was not relying exclusively on Gazprom

Another fact prevents the story from becoming too neat.

Shell was also talking to:

Rosneft.

In July 2011, after the collapse of BP’s attempted strategic alliance with Rosneft, Peter Voser confirmed that Shell had held early-stage discussions with the Russian state and Rosneft about opportunities both inside and outside Russia.

He specifically acknowledged Shell’s interest in Arctic acreage, including the Russian Arctic.

Dow Jones contemporaneously reported Voser saying the discussions were still at an early stage and that any outcome would be speculative. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

That matters.

Shell’s strategy was not simply:

attach ourselves permanently to Gazprom.

A more defensible reading is:

secure access to Russian resources through relationships with the state-controlled companies capable of providing it.

Gazprom was central.

It was not necessarily exclusive.

12. September: the proposed joint venture returns to the agenda

On 15 September 2011, Alexey Miller and Peter Voser met again at Gazprom headquarters.

The official account, reproduced contemporaneously, states that the parties discussed implementation of the June agreement.

Specifically, they considered issues connected with:

creating a joint venture

for projects in:

Western Siberia;

other Russian regions;

and third countries. Oreanda News

Three months after the June signing, therefore, the venture was still prospective.

The companies were discussing its creation.

That reinforces the evidential distinction made earlier.

13. The September meeting broadened the discussion again

The Miller–Voser meeting also addressed wider cooperation in:

geological exploration;

hydrocarbon production;

processing;

and distribution;

in Russian and international oil and gas markets. Oreanda News

The progression can now be traced document by document.

November 2010

A protocol for global strategic cooperation.

April 2011

Detailed discussion of Russian and international opportunities.

June 2011

Basic terms for examining a new Shell–Gazprom Neft joint venture.

September 2011

Management discussions about actually creating that venture.

The relationship was moving incrementally from political language towards operating structures.

14. Shell’s own year-end filing shows how important Russia remained

Royal Dutch Shell filed its 2011 Annual Report and Form 20-F with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on:

15 March 2012. SEC

Its Russia section did not describe a company retreating from the country.

It recorded:

a 27.5 per cent interest in Sakhalin II;

a 50 per cent interest in Salym;

additional exploration interests in Russia;

and new exploration rights acquired during the year.

Shell also reported that total LNG sales rose to:

18.83 million tonnes in 2011,

with higher Sakhalin II production among the factors contributing to the increase. FinancialFilings

Russia remained embedded in Shell’s growth portfolio.

15. Sakhalin II was now performing better than its original nameplate figure

There is another small but telling detail in the annual report.

The original two-train Sakhalin LNG plant was designed around approximately:

9.6 mtpa.

After optimisation, Shell reported that production from the two trains reached:

10 mtpa

in 2011. FinancialFilings

The project over which Shell had fought so bitterly was not merely operational.

It was performing strongly.

That made the commercial logic of staying in Russia easier to understand.

Shell had lost control.

It had not lost the profitability or strategic value of its remaining share.

16. The proposed new partnership therefore rested on success, not failure alone

It is easy to frame every subsequent Shell-Gazprom agreement as an aftershock of the 2006 crisis.

That misses half the story.

By 2011 Shell had practical evidence that joint Russian ventures could work commercially.

Sakhalin II was exporting LNG.

Salym was producing approximately 165,000 boe per day.

Gazprom and Shell had established long-term LNG and pipeline-gas arrangements.

Both sides had experience working together.

The new venture discussions were therefore not occurring in the shadow of Sakhalin alone.

They were also being driven by the operating results that followed it.

17. But the political asymmetry had not vanished

This is where fact and commentary must be separated.

Nothing in the June agreement says:

Shell accepted a weaker political position in exchange for resource access.

Nothing in the September account says:

Gazprom was rewarding Shell for its behaviour at Sakhalin II.

No such proposition should be presented as documented fact.

But the institutional structure remained asymmetric.

Shell could provide technology, capital and international assets.

It could not grant itself licences to strategic Russian resources.

Russian state-controlled companies occupied the stronger position in determining access.

That structural fact helps explain why partnership became central to Shell’s Russian strategy.

It does not prove a secret bargain.

18. The High Court record remains relevant — but only as history

The surviving judicial record concerning Sakhalin II remains:

Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin).

Mr Justice Mitting delivered judgment on 17 March 2008.

The case concerned access to environmental information relating to possible UK financial support for Sakhalin II.

It recorded the project’s environmental significance and the ownership transition involving the Russian participant.

It did not consider the 2010 strategic protocol.

It did not consider the 2011 Gazprom Neft agreement.

It did not rule on Shell’s decision to expand its Russian partnerships.

And it made no finding that later commercial cooperation constituted compensation for Shell’s earlier loss of control. vLex

The court record supplies historical context.

It does not supply motive.

19. What was actually created in June 2011?

The documentary answer is narrower than the headline ambition.

The parties created:

an agreed framework for studying a joint venture.

They did not yet create the joint venture itself.

That distinction is supported twice:

first by the June wording;

and again by the September meeting, when Miller and Voser were still discussing the issues involved in creating the vehicle. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

This is an important example of why corporate announcements must be read literally.

“Agreement.”

“Joint venture.”

“Strategic cooperation.”

“Basic terms.”

These phrases can sound interchangeable in headlines.

Legally and commercially, they are not.

20. What the agreement nevertheless demonstrates

Even with that caution, the significance is substantial.

Shell and Gazprom had moved from:

a contested ownership restructuring;

to operating cooperation;

to LNG sales;

to global strategic cooperation;

to studying a new international joint venture.

That sequence was completed in less than five years.

The 2006 confrontation therefore did not produce a long-term commercial rupture.

It produced a different architecture for Shell’s Russian business.

One in which state-controlled Russian companies would be embedded much more deeply in Shell’s future plans.

Documentary Findings Established

On 30 November 2010, Shell and Gazprom signed a Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation covering Russian and international opportunities.

On 16 June 2011, Gazprom Neft and Shell signed basic terms governing study of a possible joint venture for projects in Western Siberia, other Russian regions and third countries. Gazprom later repeated that chronology in its official corporate records. Gazprom

The contemporary Gazprom Neft press-service account said the proposed cooperation covered exploration, production, processing and marketing of hydrocarbons. BFM.ru – деловой портал

Peter Voser described the agreement as a potential “launch pad” for joint projects in Russia and elsewhere. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

Alexander Dyukov said cooperation with Shell could provide Gazprom Neft with advanced technology, additional experience and access to assets outside Russia. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

On 15 September 2011, Alexey Miller and Peter Voser were still discussing the creation of the contemplated joint venture. Oreanda News

Shell’s 2011 Form 20-F recorded a 50 per cent interest in Salym, where production averaged about 165,000 boe/d, and a 27.5 per cent interest in Sakhalin II. FinancialFilings

Shell reported that Sakhalin II LNG production reached approximately 10 mtpa after optimisation of the two existing trains. FinancialFilings

Established broader context

Shell was simultaneously holding early-stage discussions with Rosneft concerning further Russian and international opportunities, including possible Arctic involvement. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

This shows that Shell’s Russian strategy was not confined exclusively to Gazprom.

Judicial boundary

The relevant High Court litigation concerned environmental-information disclosure and pre-dated the 2010–11 strategic agreements.

It did not adjudicate Shell’s later partnership strategy or the motives behind it. vLex

Not established

The June 2011 document did not itself establish the contemplated new joint venture.

No evidence examined here establishes that Shell was guaranteed any particular Russian field.

No evidence examined here establishes that Gazprom Neft obtained a specific overseas Shell asset under the June agreement.

No court finding establishes that later cooperation was compensation for Shell’s loss of control of Sakhalin II.

No public document examined here establishes a secret quid pro quo connecting the 2006 ownership transfer with the 2011 joint-venture negotiations.

Commentary

The language of the June agreement is revealing precisely because it was so practical.

The 2010 protocol had spoken of “strategic global cooperation.”

Seven months later the companies were asking the more difficult question:

What corporate structure would actually deliver it?

The answer under consideration was a joint venture.

Western Siberia provided an obvious starting point.

Shell and Gazprom Neft were already producing oil together at Salym.

The commercial relationship had operating history.

The technical relationship had substance.

The companies knew one another.

But “third countries” shows that the ambition went further.

Gazprom Neft did not merely want Shell’s help producing Russian oil.

It wanted the experience of working internationally.

Shell, meanwhile, wanted continuing access to a resource-rich country in which access to strategic acreage depended heavily upon relationships with state companies.

That is the bargain visible in the public record.

Not a secret bargain.

A structural one.

Resources and access on one side.

Technology, international reach and project experience on the other.

Sakhalin II had demonstrated how unequal the political relationship could become when circumstances changed.

Salym demonstrated that equal commercial partnership could nevertheless work.

By 2011 Shell was trying to build upon both lessons.

The irony remains unavoidable.

Five years earlier Shell had been struggling against the dilution of its largest Russian investment.

Now its chief executive was publicly calling cooperation with the same state-controlled corporate system a:

“launch pad”.

That does not mean Shell had forgotten Sakhalin.

It may mean Shell had learned from it.

Source Record

Royal Dutch Shell plc’s Annual Report and Form 20-F 2011, filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on 15 March 2012, records Shell’s Russian production interests, including Sakhalin II and Salym. SEC

US SEC — Royal Dutch Shell plc 2011 Form 20-F filing index

Gazprom’s official 21 June 2012 review of Shell cooperation confirms that Gazprom Neft and Shell signed the Basic Terms and Conditions on 16 June 2011, contemplating a joint venture for Western Siberia, other Russian regions and third countries. Gazprom

Gazprom — Gazprom and Shell develop cooperation in Russian and international oil and gas markets

The contemporaneous Gazprom Neft press-service account describes the purpose of the June agreement and records the statements of Alexander Dyukov and Peter Voser. BFM.ru – деловой портал

Royal Dutch Shell archive — Shell and Gazprom Neft to Implement Joint Projects

The 15 September 2011 Miller–Voser meeting record confirms that creation of the proposed venture was still under discussion three months later. Oreanda News

Contemporaneous Dow Jones reporting recorded Shell’s simultaneous early-stage discussions with Rosneft and Peter Voser’s expressed interest in Russian Arctic opportunities. Royal Dutch Shell Group .com

The relevant judicial background remains Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin), judgment of Mr Justice Mitting dated 17 March 2008. vLex

Archive disclaimer: Agreements to investigate, study or establish future ventures are not treated as completed investments unless the documentary record establishes completion. Corporate statements are distinguished from independent reporting and from judicial findings. Strategic interpretation is identified as commentary rather than fact.

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Next instalment SLF-2007-078 — The Sakhalin Papers LXVIII: From Siberia to the Arctic — Shell Takes the Gazprom Partnership Into Russia’s New Frontier

The joint-venture discussions did not disappear.

They evolved.

By 2013, Shell and Gazprom were ready to move into territory considerably more politically and environmentally sensitive than Salym.

In April 2013, during Vladimir Putin’s visit to the Netherlands, Gazprom and Shell signed a memorandum covering possible cooperation on:

Russia’s Arctic shelf.

At the same time Shell and Gazprom Neft moved toward a 50–50 venture for liquids-rich shale development in Western Siberia, with the existing Salym organisation expected to provide initial oilfield services. Gazprom’s own corporate history records the Arctic cooperation memorandum; contemporaneous accounts record the parallel shale arrangement. Gazprom

The timing would be extraordinary.

Only months earlier, Shell’s own attempt to conquer the Alaskan Arctic had ended its 2012 drilling season amid a catalogue of operational setbacks.

Yet rather than retreat from the Arctic idea, Shell was preparing to pursue another Arctic frontier —

this time with Gazprom.

The next file will examine how the partnership born from the Sakhalin crisis moved north into the Russian Arctic, and why Shell remained determined to pursue high-risk frontier oil even after its Alaskan experience had gone badly wrong.

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 4 OCTOBER 2026 was first posted on October 4, 2026 at 7:32 pm.
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A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 27, 2026 thru Sat, October 3, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Policy and Politics (7 items)

• Midterm Battleground State Poll: Political Priorities & Opinions on the Clean Energy Transition The data relating to “climate hushing” is particularly revealing, showing that — by large margins — battleground state voters (a) want politicians to spend more time talking about climate change (not less), and (b) are more likely to vote for candidates who make transitioning away from fossil fuels a top priority if elected. Environmental Voter Project, EVP staff, Sep 22, 2026.
• Gavin Newsom condemns Democrats` `climate hushing`, predicts Trump`s downfall and expects AOC to run in 2028 Energy modernization means more affordable energy and politicians should not be afraid to say it. The Guardian, Mark Hertsgaard, Sep 24, 2026.
• Fed up with Brazil’s politicians not listening, a climate scientist runs for office Luciana Gatti, who studies carbon uptake in the Amazon, aims to join Brazil’s lower house in this weekend’s elections Science, Daniel Grossman, Sep 28, 2026.
• Alito`s Recusal From Climate Case: Too Little, Too Late? The justice’s participation in the Boulder case already may have been pivotal, and his continued stock holdings—including in fossil fuels—keep an ethics cloud over the Supreme Court. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 29, 2026.
• AI Was Supposed to Cut Emissions. Instead, Fossil Fuel Companies Are Using It to Find More Oil and Gas. A new study found AI-driven fossil fuel productivity could increase emissions. Here are examples of companies already using AI to boost production. Desmog, Sarah Hofmann, Sep 30, 2026.
• A Climate Change Rebrand More politicians have stopped talking about the climate, but love of money and risky geopolitics leave the 'green transition' still moving forward. NYT, Katrin Bennhold, Oct 01, 2026.
• Texas can`t hide from climate change by stopping students from learning about it Climate change will shape the future of Texas. Students should be allowed to learn about it. The Climate Brink, Andrew Dessler, Oct 02, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (7 items)

• `Concerning` low sea ice persists as Antarctic hits third-lowest winter peak Antarctic sea ice has recorded its third-smallest winter peak extent since satellite records began 48 years ago, new data reveals. Carbon Brief, Ayesha Tandon, Sep 25, 2026.
• Who is responsible for limiting global warming to 1.5°? Climate mitigation as systems integration: researcher models and quantifies Interlocking systemic changes spanning government, industry and households necessary for adhering to a 1.5°C warming limit. Phys.org, Irene Ketting, Sep 27, 2026.
• Godzilla El Niño is about to hit the Arctic. How bad will it be? Part 1 of a 2-part collaboration between Dave Borlace ("Just have a Think") and Ella Gilbert (Dr Gilbz) about possible connections between the Super El Nino and Artic sea ice in the northern and Antarctica in the southern hemisphere. "Just have a Think" on Youtube, Dave Borlace, Sep 27, 2026.
• “Godzilla” El Niño = crashing Antarctic sea ice? Part 2 of a 2-part collaboration between Dave Borlace ("Just have a Think") and Ella Gilbert (Dr Gilbz) about possible connections between the Super El Nino and Artic sea ice in the northern and Antarctica in the southern hemisphere. Dr Gilbz on Youtube, Ella Gilbert, Sep 27, 2026.
• The impacts of this year`s record-shattering El Niño El Niño will drive severe drought from Indonesia to the Southern Africa and northern South America, with wetter winters from the US Gulf Coast to Southern South America. The Climate Brink, Zeke Hausfather, Sep 28, 2026.
• Planetary Health Check 2026 The 2026 Planetary Health Check identifies 7 of 9 planetary boundaries as exceeded and includes a special focus on carbon sinks. Planetary Health Check, Carlos Nobre et al. , Sep 29, 2026.
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Climate Change Impacts (7 items)

• Explainer: How sea level rise poses an `existential threat` to humans, heritage and nature Here, Carbon Brief unpacks some of the key ways that sea level rise threatens both societies and ecosystems. Carbon Brief, Giuliana Viglione, Sep 22, 2026.
• Sea level rise is reshaping a California beach town and threatening a key rail line “The constant pressure is sea level rise,” said Sean Vitousek, research oceanographer with the U.S. Geological Survey. “It is going to keep rising, and rising, and the beaches will retreat landward.” AP News, Amy Taxin, Sep 27, 2026.
• Antarctica`s ice loss is locked in, and extra snowfall won`t save it - that`s bad news for low-lying coastal areas elsewhere The Conversation, Yucheng Lin, Robert Kopp, Sep 30, 2026.
• Past emissions will continue warming the planet for decades New research shows that past emissions from oil, gas, coal, and cement will continue to affect the environment and increase the odds of extreme weather for decades. Futurity, U. Washington, Sep 30, 2026.
• Swiss glaciers suffer another year of record ice loss Switzerland's glaciers lost more than 5% of their ice in 2026, marking another year of rapid decline. NPR, Imogen Foulkes, Sep 30, 2026.
• Gas from thawing Arctic permafrost is changing world's climate future Two recent studies project that by the end of this century, methane in permafrost liberated by warming due to burning of fossil fuels will add a quarter degree Celsius of warmth to Earth's atmosphere. AP News, Seth Borenstein, Oct 02, 2026.
• Europe`s Extreme Summer Triggered Cascading Climate Shocks A summer of record heat, severe drought and compounding impacts tested Europe's infrastructure and resilience. Inside Climate News, Bob Berwyn, Oct 02, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (4 items)

• Scrutinizing the Achievement of Climate Targets, Part I: The Widening Reach of Implementation Litigation Columbia University's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law does a deep dive into the role of judiciaries and courts in forcing governments to actually do as they say they will to deal with climate change mitigations. Climate Law Blog, Joe Udell and Filippo Fantozzi, Sep 28, 2026.
• Inside the anti-climate campaign against researchers A POLITICO investigation reveals more than 100 open records requests demanding documents from climate scientists nationwide. Politico, Chelsea Harvey, Lesley Clark and Corbin Hiar, Sep 29, 2026.
• States want to make Big Oil pay for climate harm. Now, courts are weighing in. New York’s "climate superfund” law has suffered two losses in court, while a U.S. Supreme Court case next week could determine the fate of similar efforts nationwide. Grist, Joseph Winters, Sep 30, 2026.
• The surprising allies backing Boulder`s climate case before the Supreme Court Ranchers, conservative legal scholars, and former Republican EPA chiefs are siding against oil companies. Here's why. Grist, Kate Yoder, Oct 01, 2026.

International Climate Conferences and Agreements (1 item)

• `We want action`: Fijian climate activist sends message ahead of UN talks in Pacific Lavenia Naivalu has seen the impact of the climate crisis first-hand and is determined to amplify Pacific voices at this year’s pre-Cop summit in Fiji The Guardian, Sera Sefeti, Oct 02, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (1 item)

• Australia`s climate chief promises harder line on misinformation Senior public servant says bureaucrats will speak up about misinformation that risks policy progress. Politico, Miriam Webber, Oct 01, 2026.

Miscellaneous (1 item)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #39 A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 20, 2026 thru Sat, September 26, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Sep 27, 2026.

If you happen upon high quality climate-science and/or climate-myth busting articles from reliable sources while surfing the web, please feel free to submit them via this Google form so that we may share them widely. Thanks!

A new water tower in Turkey: $3 million. Upgrades for a museum in Stamford: $400,000. A first responders appreciation barbecue in Medina County: $10,000.

These are just some of the public investments data center companies have paid for across rural Texas in the past year.

According to a Texas Tribune analysis, data center companies have donated or invested more than $343 million across the Lone Star state for various community needs, including school programs, infrastructure repairs and emergency services. Much of that money has gone to the very communities that have fought against data center development and is seemingly an effort to win over public support through their bottomless bank accounts.

The Texas Tribune reviewed news releases, public meeting agendas, and interviewed local officials to understand how data centers are using their money in Texas. Because not every donation is made public, the total — the first of its kind compiled in Texas — is likely an undercount.

Google donated millions of dollars to the Haskell area for its hospital, pregnancy center, and other causes. Rowan Digital Infrastructure is giving $38 million to Temple for its water infrastructure, along with more money for STEM Centers at schools in nearby small towns.

Read Next The rush to power data centers is weakening the Clean Air Act Emily Jones

Data centers also created community action grants, which are used for recurring investments in the communities they’re building in. Others, such as Google’s Texas Water Impact Fund, provide funds to restore resources that cause concern for Texans or provide direct lump sum donations to both community and state funds.

As data centers move into the state at a rapid pace, Texas communities in mostly rural areas face a fiscal cliff from property tax cuts, inflation, and overall economic uncertainty. Over the last year, data center companies have stepped in as a white knight of community investment.

“There is no question that these data centers are an opportunity for rural communities that are living in the margin,” said Suzanne Bellsnyder, an editor and publisher of two Panhandle newspapers and a Substack focused on rural issues. “Most infrastructure resources are paid with tax dollars, and there’s not a ton there.”

It’s not a new strategy. Major corporations regularly invest in communities and make charitable gifts big and small. Oil and gas companies in West Texas, for example, have donated to fire and police stations and hosted back-to-school backpack drives to weave themselves into communities.

Data centers have also capitalized on tax breaks from both state and local governments. A Texas Tribune analysis earlier this year found the state will forgo at least $3 billion in sales tax revenue over the next two years due to the exemption for the state’s booming data center industry.

Read Next In rural communities, fears amplified by ‘AI slop’ and social media hamper solar boom Delaney Nolan, The Lens

Because of the negative public perception toward data centers, however, they still have some ways to go. In an August poll from The Texas Politics Project, a nonpartisan research hub focused on Texas government and politics, 57 percent of respondents said they would oppose the construction of a data center in their communities.

“I hope their intentions are good, and they’re not just trying to buy these communities off,” Bellsnyder said.

Tied into the community

It’s been two years since a tornado struck Temple, a city of just over 96,000 people that lies 70 miles north of Austin. The city was devastated. Hundreds of homes and businesses were severely damaged or destroyed. One of the buildings lost was the beloved Sammons Community Center, where senior citizens could come together for bingo, swimming, and meals.

The price tag for the city’s recovery was high — $7.7 million.

Then, Rowan Digital Infrastructure stepped in. The company is developing a $4.2 billion data center campus with six facilities planned in East Temple.

Earlier this month, Rowan announced a $38 million investment in Temple’s public infrastructure, including $25 million to the South Temple Water Infrastructure Capital Program and $10 million for an aquifer storage and recovery program.

Read Next It’s official: Data centers are slowing America’s shift away from coal Jake Bittle

As for the Sammons Community Center, city leaders have proposed a $15 million bond to rebuild it. If voters approve the measure, Rowan has promised to put $3 million to help the project. It’s one of many actions that has made Rowan stand out to Tim Davis, Temple’s mayor, particularly since the company is not making money from the town yet.

“To go ahead and invest dollars into the community for a current need is very generous of them,” Davis said. “That tells me they want to work hard to have a positive impact, and they’ve chosen to help the city.”

Gaining public support is an important tactic for data center companies coming to Texas, and one that can’t be ignored. Over the last year, communities all over the state have voiced opposition to data centers coming to their areas — their main concerns being rising electric bills, losing water and housing issues. Some cities have prevented developments from moving forward. For example, a project in East Texas was pulled after community backlash, and Lubbock leaders passed a 90-day moratorium on large-scale projects following a citizen-led petition.

Nathaniel Brown, director of public relations for Rowan, admits that integrating into a community hasn’t been an easy task. Brown said Rowan began hosting neighbor dinners every month for residents to talk with the construction team and ask them questions. The company has also held public hearings and open houses and has Facebook pages dedicated to its project updates.

“This development doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It needs to be able to fit into the community’s vision for their area,” Brown said.

Read Next Nebraska wants data centers to come clean about water usage Anila Yoganathan

Google has used a similar strategy. On top of community meetings, the tech company hosted a dinner in August to announce $6 million for nonprofits in Haskell, Stamford and Rule.

Suzie Shin, manager of data center sustainability programs for Google, said some of their investments are the company’s way of saying they are listening to the public’s concerns. The company has given millions toward major water infrastructure projects, as well as supporting local school programs. Most recently, the company announced a $4.5 million commitment to help Vernon, a town with less than 10,000 residents, fix a leaking pipeline.

Shin said she feels strongly about investing in modernizing water and wastewater infrastructure for the broader community, not just their data centers.

“I think there’s a win-win for communities,” Shin said. “Again, we have employees who live and work there. We are part of the community. It’s a great way to show the value and help improve outcomes, not only for the watershed but for the water users there.”

Bellsnyder, the newspaper publisher and resident in Spearman, said she’s spoken with some of the data center executives who visit the Texas Panhandle. She does think their intentions are to partner with the communities and make them better.

However, she’s still wary because of the boom-and-bust industrial patterns that have become all too familiar for rural Texas. Spearman was built by an oil and gas service company, Bellsnyder said, and when the business left, there wasn’t a long-term plan for the town.

“I don’t want our entire identities to be built around what one company can provide to us,” Bellsnyder said. “We still need to figure out ways to take care of our own business. Nobody likes taxes, but taxpayers will have to be invested in the community.”

Pros vs. cons

When the water tower went out in Turkey, a small Panhandle town of about 275 residents, people were without water for weeks and had to find places in other towns to live temporarily. Lynette Findley, the city manager, said everyone’s known for years that the tower would fail. However, with an annual budget of $500,000, the city had no way to pay for it to be fixed.

After weeks of no water, QTS Data Centers, one of the data center companies in the county, said it would replace it for the city. The cost for the company, which is a major global data center developer, is estimated to be between $3 million and $5 million.

“It was right before major conversations were starting on how QTS could help with our infrastructure,” Findley said. “I joke about it failing at the exact right time.”

For cities and towns facing a budget crunch, data centers are hard to turn away, especially as the Legislature continues to cut their resources. Kevin Hodges, the city manager for Childress, said the more restrictions on cities, the less money they have to put into the city’s needs.

Read Next Climate activists take on a new foe: Data centers Kate Yoder

Childress is facing a similar problem as Turkey. The small town of just over 5,834 people has been under a boil-water notice for a month, and the town issued a disaster declaration because of the problems. Local leaders have handed out bottled water to residents the last few weeks, and employees from IREN, one of the two data centers in town, stepped in to help.

“We’ve had some of our employees help distribute water, particularly to folks who might be challenged to get it, or to the health services, and the elderly,” said David Shaw, COO of IREN. “We’ve been in Childress for around four years now, so it was important to us to establish that connection with the community.”

Hodges, the city manager, blames the ongoing drought for their water issues because Greenbelt Lake levels dropped. While people in town blame the town’s water shortage problems on IREN and Lancium, another data center company in town, Hodges says they are helping.

“The fact of the matter is Lancium does not get any water from Greenbelt Lake,” Hodges said. “They get zero, but they’re willing to give us water from their own water wells.”

While Lancium does not take water from the lake, the company does have wells to take water from the nearby Blaine Aquifer. Hodges said Lancium is running a 16-mile pipeline from its campus to the Greenbelt storage tank, and the company will treat and provide the city with 1 million gallons of water a day — all with no cost to the town, Hodges said.

Read Next Cow manure could be the next data center fuel Marin Scotten, Sentient

“They’re not taking,” Hodges said. “They’re providing.”

Hodges said the Legislature will look into more property tax cuts and other measures that could cause cities to lose money. That will hurt small towns, Hodges said, but data centers could give municipalities the money they wouldn’t normally get.

Davis, Temple’s mayor, agrees. He said municipalities are also impacted by inflation, and delivering essential services is expensive. However, the tax revenue generated by a data center will allow a city to set its own path financially, Davis said.

“If the ability to raise money is hampered, then those dollars have to come from somewhere,” Davis said. “Or, a community simply delivers less services to its residents. And I don’t think that’s acceptable to them.”

Still, Davis said leaders have to weigh the city’s capabilities and guard against any damage that could happen from a data center moving in.

Findley, the city manager in Turkey, said QTS and Lancium have promised to help with other needs too by providing funds for emergency services and the schools. She said all the contracts are with Hall County — not the city — and they are trying to navigate what has been put in their backyard.

“Data centers get a ton of negative publicity, so I’m sure it is a little self-serving on their end,” Findley said. “But to be honest, I don’t know what we would have done without their assistance.”

Alejandra Martinez contributed to this reporting.

Disclosure: Google has been a major financial supporter of The Texas Tribune. The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations, and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in our journalism. Find a complete list of them and more information about our financial and disclosure policies here.

PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: "https://www.texastribune.org/2026/10/01/texas-data-centers-reputation-rural-towns-funding/", urlref: window.location.href }); } }

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline To win over locals, data centers pump $340M into rural Texas projects on Oct 4, 2026.

Headline News:

• “Like A ‘Huge Game Of Monopoly’: Green Councillor Not Impressed By Amazon Wind Farm Agreement” • The Shetland Islands Green councilor Alex Armitage says he is “disgusted at the way Shetland’s renewable resources are being passed around by huge corporations.” He said it is as if corporations are “playing a huge game of Monopoly.” [Shetland News]

Mossy Hill wind farm (Statkraft image, cropped)

• “Australia Is Making Big Bets On A Slow Transition, But The Technology S-Curve Tells A Different Story” • Based on the historical Australian and global energy data, logistic S-curve projections suggest that renewable electricity growth and decline of fossil fuels are approaching the fastest part of a transition that has been under way for decades. [Renew Economy]
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• “OpenAI Safety Staffer Quits, Says AI Labs Should Run Like Nuclear Plants” • A leading member of OpenAI’s safety team has quit, warning that the company is not taking enough care with AI’s risks. In an essay for The Atlantic, David Robinson wrote that the ChatGPT maker “has thrived by trial and error.” He warned that approach no longer works. [The Next Web]
• “Big Oil Fears The Evidence Of Its Deliberate Climate Lies” • No one knows how the US Supreme Court will rule in Suncor v Boulder, which will likely decide whether the city and county of Boulder, Colorado, will be able to put oil giants ExxonMobil and Suncor Energy on trial for deceiving the public for decades on the climate harms of fossil fuels. [Asia Times]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

The Macorna wind project will have a simpler ride through state planning, and insists it is still viable even if the proposes VNI West transmission line is not built.

The post Not a “dealbreaker:” Big Victorian wind project doesn’t need VNI West appeared first on Renew Economy.

One of the heaviest and longest road trips ever undertaken in Australia's energy transition has been completed, with the delivery of a 195-tonne transformer for a new big battery.

The post Huge 195-tonne transformer arrives at big battery site after 1,300 km road trip appeared first on Renew Economy.

Australia has a choice between investing in the future we can already see – or subsidising a fossil-fuel past that is rapidly losing its grip.

The post Australia is making big bets on a slow transition, but the technology S-curve tells a different story appeared first on Renew Economy.

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 3 OCTOBER 2026 SLF-2007-076 The Sakhalin Papers LXVI: “Strategic Global Cooperation” — Four Years After the Kremlin Crisis, Shell Signs a Worldwide Pact with Gazprom On 30 November 2010, Royal Dutch Shell chief executive Peter Voser and Gazprom chairman Alexey Miller signed a “Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation”. The language was striking. Shell and Gazprom would examine exploration and production opportunities in western Siberia and the Russian Far East, downstream cooperation in Russia and Europe, and even Gazprom participation in Shell projects outside Russia. Shell described the relationship as a “strong partnership”. This was less than four years after Gazprom had taken control of Sakhalin II during one of the most contentious episodes in Shell’s modern history. The protocol did not erase what had happened at Sakhalin. It showed what Shell decided to do afterwards.

Archive reference: SLF-2007-076
Collection: The Sakhalin Papers
Principal authenticated records: Royal Dutch Shell plc Form 6-K filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, December 2010; Royal Dutch Shell fourth-quarter and full-year 2010 results; Royal Dutch Shell plc Form 6-K of December 2006
Contemporaneous reporting: The Guardian; Dow Jones/Wall Street Journal reporting preserved in the Donovan archive; Bloomberg
Judicial context: Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin)
Evidence standard: The 2010 protocol, its stated scope and the parties’ public statements are treated as established corporate facts. Contemporary descriptions of the 2006 Sakhalin ownership transfer as forced or Kremlin-driven remain attributed descriptions. No court identified here found that Shell entered the 2010 agreement because of coercion, a secret bargain or an earlier promise of access to Russian resources.

Introduction

Four years earlier, Shell had been fighting to preserve control of Sakhalin II.

By December 2006, it had agreed to halve its interest.

Gazprom would acquire:

50 per cent plus one share.

Shell would fall from:

55 per cent to 27.5 per cent.

The transaction price was:

$7.45 billion.

Shell would remain technical adviser, but Gazprom would become the leading shareholder. Shell’s own SEC filing recorded those terms. SEC

The political and environmental battle surrounding that transaction has occupied much of this archive.

But by late 2010 Shell’s language had changed dramatically.

It was no longer merely accommodating Gazprom inside Sakhalin II.

It was inviting Gazprom into a potentially worldwide relationship.

1. 30 November 2010: the protocol is signed

The most authoritative source is Shell’s own filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Royal Dutch Shell furnished a Form 6-K containing the announcement:

“GAZPROM AND SHELL AGREE TO PURSUE BROADER COOPERATION”

The release stated that Alexey Miller and Peter Voser had signed:

a protocol on strategic global cooperation.

Shell said the agreement established “basic guidelines” for broader collaboration. SEC

That phrase matters.

This was not a Sakhalin operating note.

It was not an amendment to an LNG sales contract.

It was a framework for a much wider relationship.

2. The proposed cooperation crossed Russia from west to east

Shell’s SEC filing identified one principal area of potential cooperation as:

exploration and production of hydrocarbons in:

western Siberia

and

the Russian Far East.

Those two regions represented very different opportunities.

Western Siberia was Russia’s mature hydrocarbon heartland.

The Far East included Sakhalin and the emerging Asia-Pacific export strategy.

Shell was therefore contemplating cooperation with Gazprom not around a single asset but across two enormous producing regions. SEC

3. Gazprom could also enter Shell projects outside Russia

The second provision was even more revealing.

Shell and Gazprom would examine:

downstream oil-products cooperation in Russia and Europe

and:

Gazprom participation in Shell upstream projects outside Russia.

That represented an important change in the direction of the relationship.

Until then, the public story had largely involved Shell seeking access to Russian resources.

Now Gazprom was being offered the possibility of access to Shell-controlled or Shell-participated opportunities elsewhere in the world. SEC

The partnership was explicitly becoming reciprocal.

4. Gazprom had already explained the principle of reciprocity

The day before the protocol was announced, Gazprom deputy chief executive Alexander Medvedev made the logic unusually clear.

Contemporaneous Dow Jones reporting recorded him saying that Gazprom welcomed foreign partners into Russian upstream projects:

“only if in exchange we get the access to their first class projects somewhere in the world.”

He added that Gazprom knew Shell possessed assets that might interest it. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

This is one of the most revealing statements in the entire post-Sakhalin sequence.

Gazprom was not presenting access to Russian reserves as a one-way commercial opportunity.

It was describing access as something to be exchanged.

Russian resources for international assets.

5. Shell called it a “strong partnership”

Peter Voser’s language was equally notable.

Shell’s SEC-filed announcement quoted him saying:

“This underscores the strong partnership our companies have built in recent years.”

He continued that Russia was an important area for new energy development for Shell and would play a large role in meeting future global oil and gas demand. SEC

The expression “strong partnership” deserves to be read against the chronology.

Those “recent years” included:

the environmental confrontation of 2006;

Gazprom’s acquisition of control;

Shell’s reduction from 55 per cent to 27.5 per cent;

the 2007 completion of that transaction;

the start-up of LNG exports in 2009;

and the rapid commercial deepening described in yesterday’s file.

The company that had lost control was now formally celebrating the partnership that followed.

6. Gazprom saw “new large-scale projects”

Alexey Miller was even more expansive.

Shell’s filing records Miller describing the agreement as a mutually beneficial strategic partnership between major energy companies.

He said the future held:

“new large-scale projects”

and a growing joint presence in new markets. SEC

This was therefore not presented as defensive diplomacy.

Gazprom was talking about expansion.

Shell was talking about partnership.

Both sides were looking beyond Sakhalin II.

7. Joint working groups were to turn the protocol into projects

The protocol was not itself a final investment decision.

No specific new field was awarded to Shell on 30 November.

No overseas Shell asset was transferred to Gazprom.

No new LNG train was formally approved.

The document was a framework.

Shell’s release explicitly stated that:

Shell and Gazprom would create joint working groups

to develop the opportunities further. SEC

That distinction is important.

A protocol establishes intent.

It does not prove that every contemplated project subsequently materialised.

8. Shell already had two substantial Gazprom-linked positions in Russia

The Shell announcement itself identified the existing foundation of the relationship.

First:

Sakhalin II.

Gazprom and Shell had been partners there since 2007.

Second:

Salym.

Shell and Gazprom Neft were jointly developing a group of oil fields in western Siberia. SEC

That gave the new global protocol a practical base.

The parties were not strangers signing a speculative memorandum.

They were already sharing producing assets.

9. By 2010 Sakhalin II was no longer an unfinished megaproject

The timing was commercially significant.

When the Kremlin agreement had been signed in December 2006, Sakhalin II Phase 2 was still under construction.

Shell’s 2006 SEC filing said the project was more than 80 per cent complete and that roughly $12 billion had already been invested by the end of the third quarter. SEC

By 2010, the project was operating.

Russia’s first LNG plant had opened.

LNG exports were flowing.

Sakhalin II had ramped towards full production.

The argument was no longer about whether the giant project could be completed.

It had become a valuable producing asset.

10. Shell told investors the Gazprom protocol was a material portfolio development

The agreement did not disappear into a public-relations archive.

When Shell announced its fourth-quarter and full-year 2010 results, it listed the Gazprom protocol among its major Upstream portfolio developments.

Shell told investors:

“In Russia, Shell signed a protocol on strategic global cooperation with Gazprom”

covering broader collaboration in both Upstream and Downstream businesses. PR Newswire

That inclusion is important.

Shell itself treated the protocol as part of its strategic portfolio story.

11. Sakhalin was already contributing to Shell’s LNG growth

The same full-year results provide the commercial background.

Shell reported LNG sales volumes of:

16.76 million tonnes in 2010,

up from:

13.40 million tonnes in 2009.

An increase of:

25 per cent.

Shell specifically said the increase reflected, among other things, the ramp-up of Sakhalin II LNG sales. PR Newswire

This helps explain why continued cooperation was commercially attractive.

Whatever Shell thought of the events that had cost it control, Sakhalin II was now producing cash-generating LNG within a growing global gas business.

12. Contemporary journalists immediately noticed the irony

The contrast with 2006 was not lost on observers.

The Guardian reported the agreement under the headline:

“Shell and Gazprom sign ‘global co-operation’ pact.”

Its report stressed that the deal had been signed almost four years after Shell surrendered control of Sakhalin II following intense Kremlin pressure.

Analyst Peter Hitchens of Panmure Gordon described the situation as:

“slightly ironic”.

He also argued that foreign companies partnered with Gazprom appeared to fare better in Russia than those attempting to operate independently. The Guardian

That was an analyst’s interpretation.

It was not Shell’s formal explanation.

But it captured the obvious historical tension.

13. The arrangement offered something important to both sides

The commercial exchange was relatively easy to see.

Gazprom controlled enormous Russian hydrocarbon resources.

Shell possessed:

LNG technology;

international project-management experience;

global trading operations;

access to overseas upstream positions;

downstream markets;

and capital.

Gazprom wanted international reach.

Shell wanted Russian resource access.

The 2010 protocol offered a structure through which those interests could meet.

That interpretation is supported by the explicit scope of the agreement, but the precise internal valuation placed on each component by Shell and Gazprom is not public. SEC

14. The protocol also carried a remarkable risk warning

There is an almost surreal documentary detail in Shell’s own SEC filing.

Immediately after announcing its expanded strategic partnership with Gazprom, Shell’s formal cautionary language warned investors about:

political risk;

expropriation;

and:

“renegotiation of the terms of contracts with governmental entities.”

It also warned about regulatory developments, project approvals and the risks of operating internationally. SEC

These were standard Shell forward-looking-statement warnings.

They were not written specifically about Russia.

That qualification matters.

But in the context of Sakhalin II, the juxtaposition is extraordinary.

The press release celebrated deeper Russian cooperation.

Its legal boilerplate simultaneously described precisely the class of political and contractual risks that international investors associated with the Sakhalin episode.

15. Compare the two Shell filings: 2006 and 2010

Placed side by side, Shell’s own SEC filings tell the transformation remarkably clearly.

December 2006

Gazprom would acquire 50 per cent plus one share of Sakhalin Energy.

Shell’s holding would fall to 27.5 per cent.

Gazprom would become the leading shareholder.

Shell would remain technical adviser.

The parties would establish an Area of Mutual Interest covering future Sakhalin opportunities. SEC

November 2010

Shell and Gazprom signed a protocol on:

strategic global cooperation.

They would consider Russian upstream development.

They would consider European downstream cooperation.

Gazprom might participate in Shell upstream projects outside Russia.

Joint working groups would develop the opportunities. SEC

The relationship had moved from one project to a potential international alliance.

16. The 2006 Area of Mutual Interest had foreshadowed this direction

The 2006 filing contained a detail whose significance became clearer later.

Shell, Gazprom, Mitsui and Mitsubishi agreed to establish an:

Area of Mutual Interest

covering future oil and gas exploration around Sakhalin and the development of Sakhalin II as a regional oil and LNG hub. SEC

The 2010 strategic protocol did not arise from nowhere.

It enlarged a pattern already embedded in the ownership settlement.

The deal that removed Shell’s control also created mechanisms for future cooperation.

That fact should not be mistaken for proof that future access was secretly promised in return for Shell surrendering control.

The documents do not establish such a bargain.

They do establish continuity.

17. Bloomberg was already reporting possible Sakhalin expansion by the end of December

Within a month of the strategic protocol, the possibility of further Sakhalin expansion was publicly circulating.

Bloomberg reported on 29 December 2010 that Gazprom and Shell might add a third LNG train at Sakhalin II or build another LNG plant.

The Sakhalin regional governor also referred to possible asset swaps involving Gazprom’s Sakhalin III interests.

Gazprom itself said it had no information to confirm the specific LNG expansion proposal at that stage, and Shell declined to comment. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Again, this distinction matters.

Expansion was being discussed.

It was not yet approved.

18. The High Court record still imposes an evidential boundary

The judicial context remains:

Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin).

Mr Justice Mitting’s judgment independently recorded the controversy surrounding Sakhalin II, the contemplated British export-credit support and the project’s environmental significance.

But the High Court case concerned access to environmental information.

It did not decide why Gazprom obtained control.

It did not adjudicate a secret Kremlin bargain.

It did not determine whether Shell had been unlawfully forced to sell.

And it did not consider the 2010 strategic cooperation agreement, which did not yet exist. vLex

That legal boundary remains essential.

The corporate and journalistic record may support conclusions about strategy and political context.

It cannot be converted into a judicial finding that was never made.

19. What the evidence establishes

By November 2010, several propositions are no longer matters of interpretation.

Shell had accepted minority status at Sakhalin II.

Sakhalin II was producing LNG.

Shell and Gazprom were already commercially linked in western Siberia.

Shell wanted additional Russian opportunities.

Gazprom wanted participation in international projects.

Both sides publicly described deeper cooperation as desirable.

And the relationship had advanced to a formal:

Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation.

That is documentary fact.

20. What the documents do not establish

The public record examined for this instalment does not establish that:

Shell was secretly promised new Russian fields in return for surrendering control of Sakhalin II;

the 2010 protocol was compensation for the 2006 transaction;

Gazprom guaranteed Shell participation in Sakhalin III, Yamal or any particular future field;

Shell privately regarded Gazprom as a trustworthy partner;

the Kremlin admitted using environmental regulation as commercial leverage;

or the 2006 transfer of control was declared unlawful by any court.

Those propositions would require evidence beyond the material presently available.

Documentary Findings Established

On 30 November 2010, Alexey Miller and Peter Voser signed a Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation. SEC

The agreement contemplated further exploration and production cooperation in western Siberia and the Russian Far East.

It contemplated downstream cooperation in Russia and Europe.

It also contemplated Gazprom participation in Shell upstream projects outside Russia. SEC

Shell and Gazprom agreed to establish joint working groups.

Peter Voser publicly described the relationship as a “strong partnership.”

Alexey Miller said the companies expected new large-scale projects and participation in new markets. SEC

Shell’s fourth-quarter and full-year results later identified the Gazprom protocol as an important portfolio development. PR Newswire

Shell’s 2010 LNG sales rose by 25 per cent compared with 2009, with the Sakhalin II ramp-up contributing to that increase. PR Newswire

Established historical context

Shell’s December 2006 SEC filing records Gazprom’s acquisition of 50 per cent plus one share, Shell’s reduction to 27.5 per cent and Shell’s continuing technical-adviser role. SEC

The same filing records an Area of Mutual Interest arrangement covering future Sakhalin development opportunities.

Established contemporaneous interpretation

The Guardian described Shell as having surrendered control after intense Kremlin pressure and noted the irony of the later worldwide cooperation agreement. The Guardian

Dow Jones reporting quoted Gazprom deputy chief executive Alexander Medvedev explicitly linking foreign access to Russian upstream resources with reciprocal access to international assets. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Judicial boundary

The High Court litigation concerning Sakhalin II dealt with environmental-information disclosure.

It did not adjudicate the motives behind Gazprom’s acquisition or the legality of the ownership transfer. vLex

Not established

No public document examined here establishes a secret quid pro quo between Shell’s loss of control in 2006 and subsequent Russian opportunities.

No court finding identified here establishes that Shell was unlawfully coerced into signing either the 2006 or the 2010 agreements.

The 2010 protocol itself did not guarantee that contemplated projects would proceed.

Commentary

The remarkable feature of the 2010 protocol is not that Shell continued doing business in Russia.

Large energy companies routinely continue operating after disputes with host governments.

What is remarkable is the scale of the reconciliation.

Shell did not merely preserve its reduced Sakhalin stake.

It agreed to explore a relationship extending from Siberian upstream production to European downstream markets and potentially into Shell projects elsewhere in the world.

The company that had lost control of Sakhalin II was contemplating giving Gazprom access to its own international portfolio.

There is a hard commercial logic behind that apparent contradiction.

Shell could not manufacture another Russian resource base.

Gazprom could not instantly manufacture Shell’s international LNG expertise, markets, technology and global project portfolio.

Each possessed something the other wanted.

The imbalance exposed at Sakhalin II had therefore not destroyed the relationship.

It had redefined it.

In 2005, Shell had hoped to trade part of Sakhalin II for Russian gas reserves.

In 2006, Gazprom instead obtained control of Sakhalin II under radically different terms.

By 2010 the concept of reciprocal access had returned — but on a much larger scale.

The language was no longer merely:

Sakhalin.

It was:

strategic global cooperation.

With hindsight, the phrase carries an obvious historical weight.

But the archive should resist hindsight.

In November 2010, Shell publicly regarded deeper cooperation with Gazprom as an opportunity.

Russia was part of Shell’s growth strategy.

Sakhalin II was producing valuable LNG.

Gazprom possessed resources Shell wanted.

And Shell was prepared to build upon the partnership created in the aftermath of one of the bitterest corporate confrontations it had experienced.

The Kremlin crisis had not ended the relationship.

It had changed the terms on which the relationship would continue.

Source Record

Royal Dutch Shell plc’s Form 6-K for December 2010 contains the authenticated Shell announcement of the Protocol on Strategic Global Cooperation, its proposed scope, the Miller and Voser statements, and Shell’s accompanying political-risk disclosures. SEC

US SEC — Royal Dutch Shell plc Form 6-K containing the 30 November 2010 Gazprom agreement

Royal Dutch Shell’s fourth-quarter and full-year 2010 results subsequently identified the Gazprom protocol as an Upstream portfolio development and recorded the contribution of Sakhalin II to rising LNG sales. PR Newswire

Royal Dutch Shell plc — Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2010 Results

Royal Dutch Shell’s December 2006 Form 6-K records Gazprom’s acquisition of control, Shell’s reduced shareholding, Shell’s continuing technical role and the Area of Mutual Interest arrangement. SEC

US SEC — Gazprom, Shell, Mitsui and Mitsubishi Sign Sakhalin II Protocol, December 2006

The Guardian reported contemporaneously on the historical irony of the global cooperation pact and the commercial logic seen by analysts. The Guardian

The Guardian — Shell and Gazprom sign ‘global co-operation’ pact, 30 November 2010

Contemporaneous Dow Jones/Wall Street Journal reporting preserved in the Donovan archive records Gazprom’s explicit exchange principle and Shell’s plans for broader cooperation. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com archive — Shell, Gazprom to Combine Beyond Russia, 30 November 2010

Bloomberg reporting at the end of December 2010 recorded discussion of possible Sakhalin LNG expansion and possible future asset exchanges, while noting that no such project had yet been confirmed. Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com

Royal Dutch Shell Plc .com archive — Shell, Gazprom May Expand Sakhalin LNG by 2015, Governor Says

The relevant judicial background remains Export Credits Guarantee Department v Friends of the Earth [2008] EWHC 638 (Admin), judgment of Mr Justice Mitting dated 17 March 2008. vLex

Archive disclaimer: Statements concerning future cooperation establish what Shell and Gazprom publicly contemplated in November 2010; they do not establish that every proposed opportunity proceeded. Corporate statements, journalistic interpretation and judicial findings are kept separate. No inference of a secret quid pro quo is presented as established fact.

Site-wide disclaimer applies.

Next instalment SLF-2007-077 — The Sakhalin Papers LXVII: From Protocol to Joint Venture — Shell and Gazprom Neft Move Into Western Siberia and Beyond

The November 2010 protocol was only a framework.

Seven months later, the framework began acquiring machinery.

On 16 June 2011, Gazprom Neft and Shell signed basic terms for examining a new joint venture.

Its proposed reach was striking:

western Siberia;

other Russian regions;

and:

third countries.

By September, Alexey Miller and Peter Voser were discussing implementation of the arrangement and the creation of the new venture. Contemporary Gazprom records later described the 2010 protocol as providing cooperation across exploration, production, processing and distribution in Russian and international markets. Oreanda News

The next file will examine how the grand language of “strategic global cooperation” began turning into concrete corporate structures — and whether Sakhalin II had become the template for Shell’s wider Russian strategy.

THE SHELL LEAKS FILES: 3 OCTOBER 2026 was first posted on October 3, 2026 at 8:33 pm.
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A new residential development south of Denver is the testing ground for an unusual partnership that could transform home heating and cooling across the country. 

Dandelion Energy, a geothermal startup, and Lennar, one of the nation’s largest homebuilders, recently completed construction of nearly 100 homes at the base of Colorado’s Front Range, each equipped with its own ground-source heat pump. The systems use less electricity than even the most efficient air-source heat pumps, potentially helping Colorado meet its climate goals while reducing peak energy demand and eliminating the need for new gas pipelines. 

Ground-source heat pumps draw on steady temperatures belowground to help heat and cool buildings. However, the projects’ custom designs and drilling requirements—homes typically require one or more boreholes drilled several hundred feet deep—are pricey. Drilling alone often costs more than $10,000.

Dandelion, a company that got its start at X—a “moonshot” research and development subsidiary of Alphabet, Google’s parent company—says it can complete geothermal heating and cooling projects twice as fast and at half the cost of similar installations.

Geothermal startup Dandelion Energy and homebuilder Lennar recently completed nearly 100 homes with geothermal heating and cooling at the Ken Caryl Ranch housing development in Littleton, Colorado. Phil McKenna / Inside Climate News

The company is “taking a kind of mass market and maximally efficient lens to what has historically been a bespoke kind of custom, high-end product,” said Dan Yates, Dandelion Energy’s CEO and chairman.

Earlier this year at Lennar’s Ken Caryl Ranch development, Dandelion’s drill team demonstrated a lightweight rig designed to quickly move from lot to lot, drilling boreholes and installing polyethylene pipe across the sprawling housing development before building foundations are poured.

Each home gets a single bore between 200 and 500 feet deep, where temperatures are approximately 50 degrees Fahrenheit year-round. Water circulating through the pipe is warmed or cooled by the surrounding earth before a heat pump installed in the basement of each new home provides additional heating or cooling depending on the time of year.

Dandelion’s drilling team can complete boreholes for one or more homes per day. If they had to drill a similar installation elsewhere for a single building, they could lose an entire day simply transporting the rig to and from the site.

Geothermal startup Dandelion Energy and homebuilder Lennar recently completed nearly 100 homes with geothermal heating and cooling in Littleton. Phil McKenna / Inside Climate News

Installing the devices across dozens of similar new homes at once also eliminates the need for custom plans for each building and avoids potentially costly retrofits to the buildings’ heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems.

The end result is a highly efficient heating and cooling system that Dandelion says outcompetes air-source heat pumps and conventional gas heating systems. This is especially true during cold snaps, when energy demand peaks and ground-source heat pumps use a quarter as much electricity as air-source heat pumps, Yates said. 

It’s “the only system that actually reduces peak demand and electrifies homes at the same time,” he said.

The Ken Caryl Ranch development is part of a larger initiative the company launched with Lennar in 2025 to install geothermal heating and cooling at more than 1,500 homes in Colorado over two years. Dandelion hopes to scale up to 10,000 homes per year nationwide in the coming years.

“Our mission at Dandelion is to mainstream geothermal, and we think that the time has finally arrived for that to happen,” Yates said. 

Just over a million U.S. homes have ground-source heat pumps, with approximately 100,000 new installations each year, according to a 2025 U.S. Department of Energy report. The agency found that geothermal heating and cooling could reach 7 million homes by 2035. Doing so would reduce winter peak energy demand by more than 40 gigawatts nationwide, resulting in roughly $4 billion in annual savings in U.S. electric grid costs, according to the report. 

Ground-source heat pumps currently make up just a small fraction of new home heating and cooling systems. By contrast, 3.6 million air-source heat pumps were sold in the U.S. last year, outpacing gas furnace sales for the fourth year in a row, said Yara van Ingen, an associate with BloombergNEF’s building decarbonization team.

Ground-source heat pumps are economically viable across the continental United States, according to a study published this month in the journal iScience that considered incentives, energy costs and local climate and subsurface conditions. 

“It is technically possible everywhere, and there is economic potential across all states,” said Juliet Simpson, a former research engineer at the National Laboratory of the Rockies and the study’s lead author.

A primary challenge for ground-source heat pumps is their upfront cost, which averages around $25,000 for a typical new home, according to the Energy Department report. Van Ingen added that space constraints, especially in dense urban environments, as well as permitting requirements that vary across the U.S. can also complicate borehole drilling. 

Dandelion and Lennar, an investor in the geothermal company, are among those working to lower costs. But incentives and policy changes also help. An energy efficiency program by Xcel Energy, Colorado’s largest gas and electric utility company, provides approximately $25,000 per home for new, high-efficiency buildings with a ground-source heat pump to offset added building and heat pump costs.

“For large neighborhoods with hundreds of homes, builders may receive seven-figure rebate amounts,” an Xcel spokesperson said in a written statement.

Geothermal pipes run through the basement of each building. Phil McKenna / Inside Climate News

The rebates help Xcel advance its climate goals and meet Colorado’s Clean Heat Standard requirement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 22 percent below 2015 levels by 2030.

Colorado also provides a $2,000 tax credit for ground-source heat pumps and requires homebuilders to pay for new gas service expansion pipes, costs that are not incurred if developers build all-electric homes.

Policies that incentivize high-efficiency electric heating and cooling while discouraging fossil fuel use in homes are intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, said Will Toor, executive director at the Colorado Energy Office.

Other states and utility companies also offer incentives for ground-source heat pumps, including Maryland, where Dandelion recently announced plans to install the technology in 129 new homes. In addition, commercial ground-source heat pump projects are now eligible for federal tax credits that cover 30 percent or more of total installation costs. 

“The economics just look better and better,” Jessica Silber-Byrne, senior manager of thermal energy networks for the Building Decarbonization Coalition, a nonprofit organization working to eliminate the use of fossil fuels in buildings. “There is a combination of both incentives and market signals that suggest that this is about to really take off.”

toolTips('.classtoolTips4','The process of reducing the emission of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that drive climate change, most often by deprioritizing the use of fossil fuels like oil and gas in favor of renewable sources of energy.');

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline New Colorado neighborhood could offer glimpse into the future of home energy use on Oct 3, 2026.

The post Environmental Health & Antiracism: Change Makers, Place, and Crossroads for Health Equity appeared first on ANHE.

Headline News:

• “US Senate Proposes New Permitting Framework. Should It Become Law?” • Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island was instrumental in getting a bill before the Senate that will alter radically how permitting for energy projects in the US gets done. In this hyper-partisan era, Democrats and Republicans worked together on proposed legislation. [CleanTechnica]

Solar array (Dennis Schroeder, NREL)

• “G7 Agrees To 100 Million Barrel Emergency Oil Release Under US Pressure” • After Trump threatened a ban of diesel exports, G7 countries agreed to release up to 100 million barrels of oil from strategic reserves over four months in a coordinated effort to bring down soaring energy prices, with a particular focus on diesel. [Euronews]
• “OpenAI Reveals Another Hack Into A Government Agency In Australia” • OpenAI, a company based in California, revealed a hack into a second Australian government agency, a week after the disclosure of an initial hack fueled public backlash against the ChatGPT-maker. OpenAI issued an apology for the security breach last week. [ABC News]
• “Italy’s Firefighting Planes Return Home After Summer Of Battling Blazes All Across Europe” • After a gruelling summer skimming lakes and coastlines to dump thousands of tonnes of water on wildfires burning across a parched Europe, Italy’s fleet of bright yellow and red Canadair planes finally returned home to a base near Rome for maintenance. [Euronews]
• “Amazon To Invest $1 Billion Into Communities Amid A Backlash Against Data Center Rollouts” • Amazon is investing more than $1 billion over five years into communities where it operates data centers for education, job training, and other local priorities as it reacts to a growing backlash to the tech industry’s rollout of the massive buildings. [ABC News]

For more news, please visit geoharvey – Daily News about Energy and Climate Change.

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