Oil giant's leaked data reveals 'awful' pollution BBC Eye Investigation .OwenPinnell 19 Mar 2025 The BBC has also obtained figures showing the company has spilled oil hundreds of times since then. Colombian energy giant Ecopetrol has polluted hundreds of sites with oil, including water sources and biodiverse wetlands, the BBC World Service has found. Data leaked by a former employee reveals more than 800 records of these sites from 1989 to 2018, and indicates the company had failed to report about a fifth of them.The BBC has also obtained figures showing the company has spilled oil hundreds of times since then. Ecopetrol says it complies fully with Colombian law and has industry-leading practices on sustainability. The company's main refinery is in Barrancabermeja, 260km (162 miles) north of the Colombian capital Bogota. The huge cluster of processing plants, industrial chimneys and storage tanks stretches for close to 2km (1.2 miles) along the banks of Colombia's longest river, the Magdalena – a water source for millions of people.Members of the fishing community there believe oil pollution is affecting wildlife in the river.Ecopetrol says it complies fully with Colombian law and has industry-leading practices on sustainability. Ecopetrol has polluted hundreds of sites with oil, including water sources and biodiverse wetlands, the BBC World Service has found.Data leaked by a former employee reveals more than 800 records of these sites from 1989 to 2018, and indicates the company had failed to report about a fifth of them.
Data leaked by a former employee reveals more than 800 records of these sites from 1989 to 2018, and indicates the company had failed to report about a fifth of them.The BBC has also obtained figures showing the company has spilled oil hundreds of times since then. Ecopetrol says it complies fully with Colombian law and has industry-leading practices on sustainability.
The company's main refinery is in Barrancabermeja, 260km (162 miles) north of the Colombian capital Bogota.The huge cluster of processing plants, industrial chimneys and storage tanks stretches for close to 2km (1.2 miles) along the banks of Colombia's longest river, the Magdalena – a water source for millions of people. Members of the fishing community there believe oil pollution is affecting wildlife in the river. In places, a film with iridescent swirls could be seen on the surface of the water - a distinctive signature of contamination by oil. A fisherman dived down in the water and brought up a clump of vegetation caked in dark slime. Pointing to it, Yuly Velásquez, president of Fedepesan, a federation of fishing organisations in the region, said: "This is all grease and waste that comes directly from the Ecopetrol refinery." Ecopetrol, which is 88% owned by the Colombian state and listed on the New York Stock Exchange, rejects the fishers' claims that it is polluting the water. In response to the BBC's questions, it says it has efficient wastewater treatment systems and effective contingency plans for oil spills.
The wider area is home to endangered river turtles, manatees and spider monkeys, and is part of a species-rich hotspot in one of the world's most biodiverse countries. Nearby wetlands include a protected habitat for jaguars.When the BBC visited last June, families were fishing together in waterways criss-crossed by oil pipelines. One local said some of the fish they caught released the pungent smell of crude oil as they were cooked. In places, a film with iridescent swirls could be seen on the surface of the water - a distinctive signature of contamination by oil. A fisherman dived down in the water and brought up a clump of vegetation caked in dark slime. Pointing to it, Yuly Velásquez, president of Fedepesan, a federation of fishing organisations in the region, said: "This is all grease and waste that comes directly from the Ecopetrol refinery."Ecopetrol, which is 88% owned by the Colombian state and listed on the New York Stock Exchange, rejects the fishers' claims that it is polluting the water.
In response to the BBC's questions, it says it has efficient wastewater treatment systems and effective contingency plans for oil spills.One database he has shared, dated January 2019, contains a list of 839 so-called "unresolved environmental impacts" across Colombia. Ecopetrol uses this term to mean areas where oil is not fully cleaned up from soil and water. The data shows that, as of 2019, some of these sites had remained polluted in this way for over a decade. Mr Olarte alleges that the firm was trying to hide some of them from Colombian authorities, pointing to about a fifth of the records labelled "only known to Ecopetrol"."You could see a category in the Excel where it lists which one is hidden from an authority and which one is not, which shows the process of hiding stuff from the government," says Mr Olarte. The BBC filmed at one of the sites marked "only known to Ecopetrol", which was dated 2017 in the database. Seven years later, a thick, black, oily-looking substance with plastic containment barriers around it was visible along the edge of a section of wetland. Mr Bayón blamed sabotage for many oil spills.
Colombia has a long history of armed conflict, and illegal armed groups have targeted oil facilities - but "theft" or "attack" are only mentioned for 6% of the cases listed in the database.He also said he believed there had been a "significant advance" since then in solving problems that lead to oil pollution. However, a separate set of data shows Ecopetrol has continued to pollute......the usual corporate flim flam- read on https://www.bbc.com/news/