On Wednesday, the UK Supreme Court ruled that it was too late for Nigerian claimants to sue two Shell (SHEL.L) subsidiaries over an offshore oil spill in 2011 that they claimed had a devastating long-term impact on the coastal area where they live.
Shell has been fighting a series of legal battles in London courts against residents of Nigeria’s oil-producing Niger Delta, a region plagued by pollution, conflict, and corruption linked to the oil and gas industry.
The action was prompted by the leakage of an estimated 40,000 barrels of crude oil on December 20, 2011, during the loading of an oil tanker at Shell’s massive Bonga oil field, 120 kilometers off the delta’s coast.
A group of 27,800 people and 457 communities have attempted to sue Shell, claiming that the resulting oil slick harmed farming, fishing, drinking water, mangrove forests, and religious shrines.
But a panel of five Supreme Court justices unanimously upheld rulings by two lower courts that found they had brought their case after the expiry of a six-year legal deadline for taking action.
The claimants’ lawyers argued that the ongoing effects of the pollution constituted a “continuing nuisance,” a type of civil tort, and thus the deadline did not apply.
“The Supreme Court rejects the claimants’ submission. “There was no continuing nuisance in this case,” wrote Justice Andrew Burrows in his decision.
Shell had disputed the claimants’ allegations, saying the Bonga spill did not impact the shoreline. The court did not rule on the disputed facts because it was only concerned with the legal issue of nuisance.
Just two Nigerian citizens were appellants in the Supreme Court case, but the ruling will also apply to the thousands of other claimants.
Shell said the Supreme Court ruling had brought to an end all legal claims in English courts related to the spill.
“While the 2011 Bonga spill was highly regrettable, it was swiftly contained and cleaned up offshore,” a Shell spokesperson said.
An email requesting comment from the lawyer for the Nigerian appellants was not immediately returned.
The Supreme Court has previously ruled against Shell in another case involving pollution in the Niger Delta. In February 2021, it allowed a group of 42,500 farmers and fishermen from the Ogale and Bille communities to sue Shell over spills, and that case is currently going through the High Court.
In a separate case, Shell agreed in 2015, after a protracted legal battle in London, to pay the delta’s Bodo community 55 million pounds ($70 million) in compensation for two spills.