Cayenne, French Guiana

The defenders

We are working alongside five other associations: Greenpeace France, Sea Shepherd France, Amis de la Planète France, Guyane Nature Environnement, Nature Rights and ZEA. The collective ‘Stop Pétrole Offshore Guyane’ and young people from French Guiana have also joined us.

State of the environment

This third extension of the permit, granted due to ‘exceptional circumstances’, was obtained despite more than 7,000 unfavourable opinions issued during the public inquiry. Drilling poses a direct threat to the Amazon coral reef located in this area. This ecosystem is very fragile and composed of corals, sponges and algae. The fragility and importance of this ecosystem, located at the mouth of the Amazon River between French Guiana and northern Brazil, was the subject of a public report by scientists in 2016. Together, we denounce the irregularities and grey areas that allowed Total to obtain this extension. We have filed an initial legal appeal with the Administrative Court of Cergy against the State, on the grounds of “denial of the right to public participation due to the failure to refer the matter to the National Commission for Public Debate (CNDP), which had nevertheless pointed out that this was mandatory; the lack of expertise and misunderstanding of the case by the investigating commissioners responsible for issuing a reasoned opinion on Total’s environmental impact study; and the shortcomings in the modelling of oil spills and the risks to neighbouring countries and territories.

Our demands

Our objective was to obtain the cancellation of this authorization granted to Total and to protect the fragile ecosystems in this area.