CI engages partners in the mining, oil and gas sector who demonstrate willingness in pursuing a true leadership position on environmental and social responsibility—to innovate, demonstrate and share responsible business practices that can deliver positive impacts for healthy ecosystems and human well-being.

FACT SHEET: Responsible Mining & Energy​​

The mining, oil and gas industry has a crucial role to play in supporting responsible development, both globally and locally. Global demand for the products of these industries—plastics, metals and energy—continues to grow every day. This demand is driving exploration and extractive activities into more remote and ecologically sensitive areas, like biodiversity hotspots that are critical for threatened species and important ecosystems that provide drinking water, food and other benefits for local communities. Our use of these resources also produces emissions that contribute to climate change. CI addresses the issue of climate change, including mitigation and adaptation, both within and beyond the sector.

Since the 1990’s, CI’s holistic approach to the sector has involved engagement with major banks, industry associations, government agencies, conservation practitioners, local communities and the world’s largest companies in South America, Europe, Africa and Asia. Despite environmental and social impacts and risks related to the sector at local levels (e.g., biodiversity loss through habitat destruction and fragmentation, disruption to ecosystem services through high volumes of water use, etc.), it continues to be a leading engine of job creation and economic development, particularly in developing countries.

CI recognizes the opportunities for improving how these industries operate and to support responsible development in emerging economies. However, CI also acknowledges the significant risks these companies pose and, therefore, conducts a thorough due diligence process before entering into any corporate partnership to assess the relative risks and benefits. CI’s vision for responsible development and sustainable economies is founded on a full appreciation of the role of healthy ecosystems in long-term human well-being.

Our partnerships have touched on all aspects of the project cycle, from exploration to closure, as well as emerging sectoral issues. We do this by working in three main areas of engagement:

Incentives

CI helps establish the external and internal incentives for driving better behavior within a company or project through: working with banks to implement conditional financing that reward responsible projects; encouraging companies to make internal changes that establish  progressive corporate commitments; supporting industry associations in efforts to make a collective commitments on behalf of their members; and raising awareness  of governments around responsible practices with the hope of strengthening  legislation that levels the playing field for all companies operating in their borders.

Tools

CI facilitates the achievement of good behavior via guidance, decision support tools and access to experts. CI has worked, often with partners, on a number of tools and guidance resources, some of which are recognized as emerging industry standards.

• IBAT, The Integrated Biodiversity Assessment Tool (IBAT) for Business is designed to facilitate access to accurate and up-to-date biodiversity information to support critical business decisions
   
• RAP, CI's Rapid Assessment Program (RAP) quickly provides the biological information necessary to catalyze conservation action and improve biodiversity protection
   
• TREMARCTOS, led by CI-Colombia, this tool integrates national data sets to supports local decision-making needs
   
• BBOP, The Business & Biodiversity Offset Program (BBOP) is a global multi-stakeholder dialogue that produced a list of 10 principles for good biodiversity offsets
   
• EBI, The Energy and Biodiversity Initiative (EBI) provided a set of and best practices for integrating biodiversity conservation into upstream oil and gas development

Project Demonstrations

CI recognizes that incentives and tools are only as useful as the results they deliver. CI is increasingly focusing on practical landscape and seascape level demonstration of replicable and successful field projects in close collaboration with national partners, which build on and learn from national expertise to improve our work and leave a lasting legacy. Examples of field projects include: Antamina, Arcelor-Mittal, BHP Billiton, Cerrejon, ExxonMobil, MPX, Rio Tinto and Vale. In all of CI’s engagement with this sector, we seek to support national priorities for responsible mining, oil and gas that contribute to achievement of healthy and sustainable economies.

For more information, contact:
Marielle Canter Weikel​
Director, Responsible Mining & Energy
CI's Center for Environmental Leadership in Business