Puma Energy Australia
OVERALL |
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Owned |
USA |
Rating |
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Fuel operator
Acquired by Chevron in 2020. Operates over 320 fuel retail locations primarily under the Puma brand, plus 14 depots and 3 bulk seaboard terminals across Australia.
Company Ownership
| Puma Energy (Australia) Pty Ltd | AUS | website | ||||
Chevron Corporation 
owns 100% of Puma Energy (Australia) Pty Ltd |
USA | website | ||||
Oil and gas USA's #2 integrated oil company, behind Exxon Mobil. Chevron also owns interests in chemicals, mining, pipeline, and power production businesses. | ||||||
Company Assessment
| PRAISE | CRITICISM | INFORMATION | ||
| Puma Energy (Australia) Pty Ltd | ||||
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Between 2013 and 2019 this company paid zero tax on a total income of $15.4 billion, earning the number 12 spot on Michael West's Top 40 Tax Dodgers 2021. West calculated which of Australia's largest companies have paid the least tax, or no tax, on the highest incomes using six years of tax transparency data published by the Australian Tax Office.
Source: Michael West (2021) |
This company has a number of sustainability claims on its website. These include a "commitment to supporting a range of community-spirited projects across Australia", safety measures, and the advancement of alternative fuels such as biodiesel.
Source: company website (2014)
According to data released by the Australian Tax Office in Jan 2022, this company was one of many local and foreign-based companies that paid no tax in Australia in 2019-20. Please note however that companies pay income tax on profits, not revenue (total income). While some companies use tax havens and loopholes to avoid paying their fair share of tax in Australia, other companies that paid no tax have perfectly legitimate reasons.
Source: ATO (2022) |
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This company is listed as having best practice on a report card on lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality in corporate America.
Source: Human Rights Campaign (2021)
JUST Capital polls Americans every year to identify the issues that matter most in defining just business behaviour. For their 2023 rankings JUST Capital asked a representative sample of 3,002 Americans to compare 20 different business Issues on a head-to-head basis, producing a reliable hierarchy of Issues ranked in order of priority. Issues are organised under the headings Workers, Customers, Communities, the Environment, or Shareholders & Governance. JUST Capital then define metrics that map to those issues and track and analyse the largest, publicly traded U.S. companies. This analysis powers their rankings, in which this company ranked 139th of 951 companies, and 3rd of 25 Oil & Gas companies.
Source: JUST Capital (2023) |
Amazon Watch's Chevron Toxico campaign is calling for a boycott of Chevron for deliberately dumping 18 billion gallons of toxic oil waste into the Ecuadorian Amazon and failing to clean it up. Now Chevron is suing anyone who speaks out against it.
Source: Amazon Watch (2020)
This company ranked 9th on the list of 100 oil & gas companies in the 2016 Carbon Underground 200, a ranking of fossil fuel companies being targeted for divestment. Companies are ranked by the potential carbon emissions content of their proven reserves. The reserves of these companies total almost five times more than can be burned for the world to have an 80% chance of limiting global temperature rise to 2°C.
Source: Fossil Free Indexes (2016)
The Talking Trash 2020 report by Changing Markets investigates the corporate playbook of false solutions to the plastic crisis. It found that the industry is actively delaying and derailing ambitious action on plastic pollution in its fight to maintain business as usual for as long as possible. For example, this plastic producing company is signed up to two nice-sounding voluntary initiatives to address plastic waste, while also participating in one industry association which lobbies against legislation that could restrict plastic, or make corporations responsible for managing the waste they create, financially or otherwise.
Source: Changing Markets (2020)
Chevron is responsible for one of the largest environmental disasters in history. Today the oil giant is waging unprecedented public relations and lobbying campaigns to avoid having to clean up environmental and public health catastrophes that continue today.
Source: FDA (2020)
As You Sow's 2022 report, 'Road to Zero Emissions', assessed the progress of 55 of the largest U.S. corporations in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in line with the Paris Agreement's objective of limiting global average temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, which requires achieving "net zero" emissions by 2050. Companies are graded on: climate related disclosures; GHG reduction targets, and GHG reductions. This company received an Overall Net Zero grade of F.
Source: As You Sow (2022)
As You Sow's 2019 report, Mining the Disclosures, is a deep analysis of 215 companies' human rights performance in relation to sourcing conflict minerals from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). This company's score was 3.3% (Weak).
Source: As You Sow (2019)
Chevron has operated in Tengiz, Kazakhstan, since 1993. This 2013 report by Crude Accountability chronicles Chevron's impact on the environment and the rights of workers and local residents through its operations in Tengiz. Chevron owns 50% of Tengizchevroil (TCO), the operator at Tengiz. TCO was fined US$33m in 2010 and over US$79m in 2012 by Kazakhstan courts for polluting the environment.
Source: Crude Accountability (2013)
This company is on Global Exchange's "Top Ten Corporate Criminals Alumni" for several serious human rights violations including damaging ecosystem and people of Ecuador, repression of protest to oil extraction, and Brazil spill.
Source: Global Exchange (2017)
As You Sow's 2019 report, 'Disclosing the Facts: Transparency and Risk in Hydraulic Fracturing Operations', benchmarks 28 companies engaged in hydraulic fracturing ('fracking') against investor needs for disclosure of operational impacts and mitigation efforts. This company only succeeded in disclosing information on 5 of the 43 indicators related to management of toxic chemicals, water and waste, air emissions, methane leakage and community impacts.
Source: As You Sow (2019)
In 2018 the Union of Concerned Scientists published their Climate Accountability Scorecard, which measures the progress of major fossil fuel companies to stop spreading climate disinformation and to fix their business plans to achieve dramatic reductions in global warming emissions. This company rated Egregious for disinformation, Poor for business planning, and Fair for policy and disclosure.
Source: Union of Concerned Scientists (2018)
This company received a score of 37.7/100 in the Newsweek Green Ranking 2017, which ranks the world's largest publicly traded companies on eight indicators covering energy, greenhouse gases, water, waste, fines and penalties, linking executive pay to sustainability targets, board-level committee oversight of environmental issues and third-party audits. Ranking methodology by Corporate Knights and HIP Investor.
Source: Newsweek (2017)
InfluenceMap's 2021 Climate Policy Footprint report identifies the world's most obstructive corporate and industry association holding back Paris Agreement-aligned climate policy. This company is named in the report as the world's second most negatively influential corporation. "Highly strategic policy engagement, promoting oil & gas in the energy mix. Dense network of industry associations actively opposing climate policy in the US and globally."
Source: Influence Map (2021)
This company is the world's 27th largest producer of single-use plastic waste, according to Minderoo Foundation's 2021 Plastic Waste Makers Index. In 2019, just 20 polymer producers accounted for more than half of all single-use plastic waste generated globally, and the top 100 accounted for 90 per cent. Plastic pollution is one of the biggest, most urgent threats facing our planet and our health.
Source: Minderoo Foundation (2021)
'The Big Con' is a 2021 report by Corporate Accountability, Friends of the Earth and others that makes clear that Big Polluters' idea of "net zero" is part of their continued plan to protect deeply unjust global systems, distract from taking the real action needed, and to evade responsibility for the climate crisis and to continue to pollute. This company was named in the report as one whose "net zero" climate commitments are anything but real action.
Source: Corporate Accountability (2021)
In January 2013 The California Division of Occupational Health & Safety issued 25 citations against Chevron with penalties of $963,200 for safety standard violations on 6 August 2012 related to the fire at the Richmond refinery factory. The penalties are the highest in California's history and the highest allowed under state law. In August 2013 Chevron agreed to pay $2m in fines and restitution which were additional to the $10m paid to affected community workers and local government agencies.
Source: Reuters (2013)
This company is on OpenSecrets.org's list of "Top Donors", a list of the 100 biggest givers in US federal-level politics since 1990. Companies on this list lobby and spend big, with large sums sent to candidates, parties and leadership PACs. This company comes in at number 79 on the list, with contributions totalling $37,163,933 between 1990 and 2020.
Source: Open Secrets (2020) |
Public Eye Awards are given to companies with the worst record in terms of environmental pollution and human rights violations. Chevron received the award in 2006 for contaminating large areas of pristine rain forest in northern Ecuador for nearly 30 years (under its former name Texaco). To this day, it refuses to carry out a comprehensive cleanup of this Amazon region. Listed under information due to age of award.
Source: Berne Declaration (2006)
This company appeared sixth on RepRisk's top ten "most environmentally and socially controversial companies of 2010". Companies on the list were severely criticised during 2010 by the world's media, governments and NGOs. Chevron received attention in the press in 2010 for the ongoing lawsuit in Ecuador, complicity in human rights violations Myanmar and Nigeria, tar sands operations, and controversial operations in Kazakhstan and Australia. [Listed under Information due to age of report]
Source: RepRisk (2010)
Major corporations, including this one, use prison labour in the USA, where prisoners are paid slave wages as low as 23 cents an hour doing work which is often dangerous, toxic and unprotected. While much of the work done by prisoners is for the military, other major corporations are taking advantage of the cheap labour in both federal and state US prisons.
Source: Global Research (2013)
In 2019 the median pay for a worker at this company was US$140,063. The CEO was paid 236 times this amount. Exorbitant CEO pay is a major contributor to rising inequality. CEOs are getting more because of their power to set pay, not because they are increasing productivity or possess specific, high-demand skills. The economy would suffer no harm if CEOs were paid less (or taxed more). In contrast, the CEO-to-typical-worker compensation ratio was 20-to-1 in 1965 and 58-to-1 in 1989.
Source: AFL-CIO (2020)
As You Sow's 2019 report, 'The 100 Most Overpaid CEOs', reveals the 100 most overpaid CEOs from USA's 500 largest public companies (as determined by the S&P 500 list). This company's CEO, John S. Watson came in at number 55 on the list, having been paid US$24,781,568 in 2018. According to the report, "Most CEOs have come to be grossly overpaid, and that overpayment is harmful to the companies, the shareholders, the customers, the other employees, the economy, and society as a whole."
Source: As You Sow (2019)
This company is listed on the Federal Contractor Misconduct Database as having 37 instances of misconduct since 1995 amounting to US$537 million in penalties. Instances include fines related to oil spills, pipeline leaks, air pollution and Oil For Food program kickbacks.
Source: Project on Government Oversight (POGO) (2014)
Named one of Multinational Monitor's '10 Worst Corporations of 2008'. [listed under information due to age of report]
Source: Multinational Monitor (2008)
The True Cost of Chevron - An Alternative Annual Report (May 2011) provides details of Chevron's activities around the world including intensification of controversial liquefied natural gas projects in Western Australia; Government fines in Kazakhstan of $64m for levels of toxins emitted; two extrajudicial killings by the Burmese army providing security for the Yadana pipeline; an Ecuadorian court ordering a $9.5b cleanup for contamination; an explosion in Indonesia leaving two children burnt and a community devastated; and disenfranchising dissenting shareholders by denying them admission to the company's AGM.
Source: The True Cost of Chevron (2011)
This company is a strategic member of the Center for Responsible Shale Development (CRSD), a collaborative effort of environmental organizations, philanthropic foundations, energy companies and other stakeholders committed to safe, environmentally responsible shale resource development (ie. fracking).
Source: CRSD (2019)
The 2019 Corporate Human Rights Benchmark assessed 200 of the largest publicly traded companies in the world from the Agricultural Products, Apparel, Extractives and ICT Manufacturing sectors on 100 human rights indicators. This company's score was in the 30-40 band range. The overall average score was a disappointing 24%.
Source: World Benchmarking Alliance (2019)
California, the UK and Australia have all enacted legislation requiring companies operating within their borders to disclose their efforts to eradicate modern slavery from their operations and supply chains. Follow the link to see this company's disclosure statement.
Source: company website (2017)
This company is recommended for divestment by the Project of the American Friends Service Committee for its involvement in the Israeli occupation of parts of Palestine. Chevron subsidiary Noble Energy extracts gas off the shores of the Gaza Strip, exacerbating the Gaza blockade and potentially involved in pillaging.
Source: AFSC (2021)
Business & Human Rights Resource Centre digital platform presents news and allegations relating to the human rights impact of over 20,000 companies. Their enhanced Company Dashboards also include financial information, key data points based on corporate policies, and scores from prominent civil society benchmarks. Follow the link and use the search function to view this company's dashboard.
Source: BHRRC (2022)
OpenSecrets.org tracks the influence of money on U.S. politics, and how that money affects policy and citizens' lives. Follow link to see this company's record of political donations, lobbying, outside spending and more.
Source: Open Secrets (2020)
This company received an S&P Global ESG Score of 43/100 in the Oil & Gas - Upstream & Integrated category of the S&P Global Corporate Sustainability Assessment, an annual evaluation of companies' sustainability practices (last updated 23 Sep 2022). The rankings are based on an analysis of corporate economic, environmental and social performance, assessing issues such as corporate governance, risk management, environmental reporting, climate strategy, human rights and labour practices.
Source: S&P Global (2022)
The Corporate Research Project's Corporate Rap Sheets are dossiers summarising the most significant crimes, violations and other questionable activities of the world's largest and most controversial companies. Follow link to see this company's Corporate Rap Sheet. "Chevron is a frequent target of criticism by environmental groups and human rights organizations for its practices in the United States and countries such as Ecuador, Nigeria, Burma, Chad and Angola."
Source: Corporate Research Project (2018)
This company is listed on the Facing Finance website as a company that manufactures weapons or profits from violations of human rights, pollution, corruption, or international law. Follow link for further details.
Source: Facing Finance (2014) |
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Company Details
| Type | Wholly-owned subsidiary |
| Employees | 2,500 (2020) |
Contact Details
| Address | 365 Macarthur Ave, Hamilton, QLD, 4007, Australia |
| Phone | 1300 723 706 |
| brisbane.reception@pumaenergy.com | |
| Website | www.pumaenergy.com.au |
Products / Brands
Puma Energy Australia|
Gull, Choice, Peak Fuel & Convenience Stores Puma Fuel & Convenience Stores |