Occidental Petroleum

Type: Public
On the web: http://www.oxy.com
Employees: 11,000
Employee growth: 8.9%

Harnessing its heritage of Western technical know-how, Occidental Petroleum engages in oil and gas exploration and production and makes basic chemicals, plastics, and petrochemicals. In 2010 the oil giant reported proved reserves of 3.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent in the US, the Middle East, North Africa, and Latin America. Subsidiary Occidental Chemical (OxyChem) produces acids, chlorine, and specialty products; it also owns Oxy Vinyls, the #1 producer of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) resin in North America. Occidental Petroleum's midstream and marketing operations gather, treat, process, transport, store, trade, and market crude oil, natural gas, NGLs, condensate, and CO2, and generate and market power.

Key numbers for fiscal year ending December, 2010:
Sales: $19,157.0M
One year growth: 23.3%
Net income: $4,530.0M
Income growth: 55.4%

Officers:
Chairman: Ray R. Irani
President, CEO and Director: Stephen I. (Steve) Chazen
EVP and CFO: James M. Lienert

Competitors:
DuPont
Exxon Mobil
Royal Dutch Shell

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Incorporated: 1920
NAIC: 211111 Crude Petroleum and Natural Gas Extraction; 324110 Petroleum Refineries; 325181 Alkalies and Chlorine Manufacturing; 325998 All Other Miscellaneous Chemical Product Manufactur- ing; 551112 Offices of Other Holding Companies

Occidental Petroleum Corporation, an oil and gas and chemicals company, conducts its business through two major subsidiaries, Occidental Oil and Gas Corporation and Occidental Chemical Corporation. Occidental Oil and Gas, representing the larger of the two business segments, operates in the United States, the Middle East, and Latin America. Domestically, the company ranks as the largest natural gas producer in California and the largest oil producer in Texas. Overseas assets in oil and gas are located in Oman, Qatar, Yemen, Columbia, Ecuador, Russia, and Pakistan. Occidental Chemical manufactures vinyls, chlorine, and caustic soda, relying on 24 manufacturing sites in the United States, two facilities in Canada, and one plant in Chile. Occidental, the governing entity for the oil and gas and chemical operations, derives roughly $7.5 billion in annual sales from its oil and gas interests and $3.6 billion from its chemicals business.

Occidental Petroleum was founded in 1920 in California. Its early years as an oil-finding entity were largely undistinguished, with the company almost bankrupt by the mid-1950s. It was Occidental Petroleum's early difficulties, however, that laid the groundwork for its later success. In 1956 Occidental Petroleum came to the attention of Armand Hammer, a millionaire well-known for his savvy and success in business dealings with the Soviet Union in the 1920s. In 1921 Hammer had met Vladimir Lenin, the leader of the Russian Revolution, and had become the first U.S. businessman to establish ties with the Soviet Union. Among other enterprises, Hammer had operated an asbestos mine, imported grain, and manufactured pencils. While in Moscow, he had purchased Russian art treasures at bargain prices, later reselling many art objects in the United States at considerable profit. (Later it was revealed that many of Hammer's treasures were fakes, and he was well aware of it.)

In 1956 Hammer and his wife Frances each invested $50,000 in two oil wells that Occidental planned to drill in California. When both wells struck oil, Hammer, nearly 60, took an active interest in further Occidental oil exploration.

At Hammer's first association with Occidental, the company was run by Dave Harris, Roy Roberts, and John Sullivan. Hammer's increased involvement, his strong personality, and his ability to raise money for oil drilling propelled him more and more into the limelight. By July 1957 Hammer had become company president.

Hammer's influence played a key role in the development of Occidental. As Steve Weinberg wrote in Armand Hammer: The Untold Story, "Few Fortune 500 corporations have come so totally under the sway of one person, especially one who owned such a tiny percentage of stock."

From his earliest days as president of Occidental, one of Hammer's overriding drives was for Oxy to diversify. In his autobiography, Hammer reported that a prime rationale for diversifying was to make Oxy too big for the other major oil companies to take over. Acquisitions included energy and chemical companies, as well as meat-producing operations.

At the time Hammer became involved with Occidental, the company was listed on very small stock exchanges on the West Coast; within several years, however, Oxy was on the American Stock Exchange, boosted by the 1959 Hammer-led acquisition of Gene Reid Drilling Company of Bakersfield, California. This acquisition was to prove fortuitous for the growth of Occidental. Hammer attracted Reid, an engineer, and his son Bud, a geologist, to the cash-poor Occidental by offering them shares of the company. Hammer was to use the stock strategy to attract talent in other acquisitions as well.

In 1961 while working with Occidental employees Richard Vaughn, Robert Teitsworth, and the Reids, Hammer took a chance on drilling the Lathrop field, near San Francisco. It had been drilled previously for natural gas by Texaco and other companies, but only to a depth of about 5,600 feet. Reid and the others suggested that there was gas farther down, and at 6,900 feet they were proven correct. Occidental made one of the largest gas finds in California. Over the course of one night, the company found gas worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

By the end of 1961, Occidental was reporting a $1 million profit on revenues of over $4 million. The company's reputation and fortune were bolstered by continued success in natural gas, as well as through more oil finds. By March 1964 Oxy's shares were trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

Through the mid-1960s, Hammer pushed Oxy more and more to occupy an international position. The company built, for example, a superphosphoric-acid plant in England and helped build a $33 million ammonia and urea plant in Saudi Arabia. Oxy also had dealings with other countries, among them Nicaragua, Venezuela, Morocco, and Turkey.

Throughout the 1960s, Hammer kept up negotiations with Libya's King Idris for the use of Libya's natural resources. This persistence was to pay off handsomely. In 1966 Oxy's potential skyrocketed, with a billion-barrel oilfield find in Libya. The find was vintage Hammer, as he wined and dined important Libyan officials and then took a risk on land previously drilled by others. The Libyan oil finds established Oxy as one of the largest petroleum companies in the world. From early 1967 until November of that same year, Oxy's stock doubled in value to more than $100 a share.

Hammer's skills as a negotiator were put to the test when the Libyan king was overthrown in a bloodless coup in 1969 and replaced by the Revolutionary Command Council, soon to be headed by Muammar Qaddafi. Many analysts feared the new government would nationalize the oilfields. However, Hammer negotiated in late 1970 an agreement by which Libya received an immediate increase of 30 cents per barrel of oil, with another ten-cent increase spread over five years. Some industry observers viewed this agreement as the beginning of the end of cheap energy, as other multinational oil companies quickly signed similar agreements with their host countries. Most petroleum-producing countries called for matching increases, and oil prices headed upward.

In the early 1970s, Hammer caused a sensation with a $20 billion long-term deal with the Soviets that featured a barter agreement by which Oxy would supply phosphate fertilizer to the U.S.S.R. in exchange for Soviet ammonia and urea. Many in the U.S. government criticized the deal, saying the agreement helped a communist country, despite the fact that the deal was consummated during a period of détente between the United States and the Soviet Union. Hammer, in fact, considered his dealings as détente through trade, and he continued this notion through trade with the Chinese, with whom he began negotiating in 1979. Oxy ended up with two offshore oil exploration and development contracts and a joint agreement to develop a Chinese coal mine.

In 1981 Oxy moved beyond the energy and chemical fields to acquire Iowa Beef Packers (IBP), the largest meatpacker in the United States. IBP cost Oxy $750 million in stock and proved a sound investment; in 1987 Oxy sold 49.5 percent of IBP to the public for $960 million. The astute business deal would be somewhat overshadowed, however, by numerous union strikes over pay and working conditions, as the United Food and Commercial Workers Union maintained Oxy management was unconcerned with workers at the packing plants.

In 1982 Hammer engineered Oxy's $4 billion acquisition of Cities Service Company, a huge domestic oil company headquartered in Oklahoma. The deal was viewed with skepticism by many investment bankers who, as reported in Hammer's autobiography, Hammer, regarded it as "Jonah trying to swallow the whale." Nevertheless, the deal made Occidental the eighth largest oil company in the United States and the country's 12th largest industrial concern. One of Hammer's first steps after the acquisition was to sell off those Cities Service units he felt Occidental did not need, resulting in about $1 billion in revenue for Oxy. Some 16,000 jobs were lost as the Cities Service workforce dropped 80 percent.

In late 1985 Hammer made another multibillion-dollar transaction, acquiring Midcon, the huge domestic natural gas pipeline company, for $3 billion. Shortly after the acquisition, the natural gas industry was deregulated. The industry, as a whole, suffered from strong competition because of deregulation, and Occidental was no exception.

In a reorganization move in May 1986, Occidental Petroleum Corporation of California became a wholly owned subsidiary of the parent company. Corporate headquarters remained in Los Angeles.

The most successful of Oxy's operations during the mid- to late 1980s was its chemical branch, Occidental Chemical (Oxychem). The chemical operations were built largely through the acquisitions of other companies. Occidental purchased holdings from Diamond Shamrock Chemicals in 1986 and from Du Pont and Shell Chemical in 1987, among others. In the five-year period from 1983 through 1987, Oxychem almost doubled its sales to nearly $3 billion. According to J. Roger Hirl, president and chief operating officer of Oxychem, as reported in Chemical & Engineering News, Oxy moved into the chemical industry as a balance to its petroleum business. While noting the cyclical nature of both the petroleum and chemical industries, Hirl said they normally were not in parallel cycles.

In 1988 Occidental, spending $2.2 billion to purchase Cain Chemical, moved up to become the nation's sixth largest chemical producer, with sales accounting for almost 25 percent of Oxy's total. Cain Chemical then became known as Oxy Petrochemicals Inc.

The late 1980s brought challenges in the form of environmental litigations. In February 1988 Oxy was found liable for cleaning up the toxic wastes at the country's most infamous landfill, Love Canal in Niagara Falls, New York. After eight years of deliberations, a federal judge ruled that Occidental was responsible for the improper disposal by Hooker Chemical of more than 21,000 tons of chemicals on the site, during the 1940s and 1950s. Occidental had purchased Hooker Chemical in 1968, unaware of the problems that began to surface in 1978. Before the ruling, Oxy had paid $20 million in damages to 1,300 former Love Canal residents, but nothing toward the cleanup of the site. Total cleanup costs were expected to exceed $100 million.

Also during this time, Oxy was hit by a disaster unequaled in oil production history. In July 1988, the company's Piper Alpha offshore oil platform exploded in Britain's North Sea, killing 167 people. The accident panicked the oil market, already made nervous by the continuing Iran-Iraq War. Oil prices were driven up immediately after the accident by as much as $1 a barrel. The accident was thought to be caused by a leak in a pressurized natural gas line that triggered the massive explosion. Occidental immediately shut down the pipeline that served the platform and five others. In August 1989 Oxy resumed North Sea production. The accident was estimated to have cost over $1 billion, including an approximately $183 million settlement with families of the victims and surviving workers.

During 1989 Oxy restructured its domestic oil and gas operations, which resulted in the loss of 900 jobs, the majority from the Oxy Oil and Gas subsidiary's headquarters in Tulsa, Oklahoma. For the year 1989, however, Oxy reported an overall increase of about 1,000 workers, due primarily to expansion at IBP and Oxychem.

Hammer's decisions did not always please stockholders. One such circumstance centered around Occidental's funding of a $95 million museum to house Hammer's valuable painting collection. The collection was worth an estimated $250 million. Many shareholders did not see the expense of building and operating a museum as serving the best financial interest of the company. The disagreement ended in the courts, in 1990, and although the Armand Hammer Museum of Art and Cultural Center would be built as planned alongside Occidental's corporate headquarters in Los Angeles, the proposed settlement called for limits on the amount of future contributions by Occidental to the museum and to other charities associated with Hammer.

Throughout his career Hammer had been able to attract talented people to Occidental. Nowhere was this more evident than with Ray Irani, the president and chief operating officer during Hammer's last years at Occidental. In 1983 Hammer had convinced Irani, the president of Olin Corporation, to run Oxychem. When Irani took over, Oxychem had an operating loss of $23 million and supplied about 9 percent of Occidental's total sales. In 1989 Oxychem had an operating profit of $1.2 billion and supplied about one-quarter of Oxy's total sales. In February 1990, the board of directors of Occidental proposed Irani as the successor to Armand Hammer as chairman and chief executive officer whenever Hammer should vacate those offices.

In 1989, Occidental reported that 94 percent of its revenues came from domestic operations compared to 55 percent from the same source in 1980. Still, Oxy continued to be involved in large foreign operations. In June 1990, for example, Oxy was the only U.S. company in a four-country agreement to build a $7 billion petrochemical plant in the Soviet Union, the largest-ever joint Soviet-Western project.

When Armand Hammer died at the age of 92 on December 10, 1990, the changeover in command at the top was expected: Ray Irani, president and chief executive officer under Hammer for six years, took over as chairman of the board. Irani worked quickly to get Oxy out from under Hammer's slew of pet projects, many of which had no place in an oil company's portfolio. He sold the meatpacking business, shed Oxy's investments in Arabian horses, got rid of its 5.4 percent stake in the makers of Arm & Hammer baking soda, and canceled a $485,000 contract for a fourth authorized Hammer biography. The University of California agreed to take over the Armand Hammer Museum, which became known as the UCLA Arts Center. Occidental even sold off the "Codex Hammer," a Leonardo Da Vinci manuscript Hammer had bought with $5.6 million of the company's money and renamed for himself. Irani also announced he was canceling the company's billion-dollar petrochemical deal with the Soviet Union. Perhaps most importantly, Irani outlined a strategy to reduce the company's debt load by 40 percent by 1992. Upon Hammer's death, the company's debt stood at a staggering $8.5 billion, and dealing with this was paramount. Irani's strategy called for selling unneeded assets, and also included slashing stockholder dividends to $1 a share from $2.50.

Occidental's restructuring went on in several stages throughout the early 1990s. By the end of 1992, the company had met its first set of goals, reducing its debt by $3 billion. However, Occidental announced that it still intended to cut its costs by $300 million by cutting capital spending, eliminating jobs, and instituting a salary freeze. At the same time, the company dedicated more money to international oil and gas exploration, increasing its production of oil from abroad, with operations in Yemen, Oman, and Ecuador. At that time, about half of the company's revenues came from its chemical business. In 1995, Oxy announced it was simplifying the management of its oil and gas operations in an attempt to grow that business and get away from its dependence on chemicals. Occidental formed a single operating company to take on all its oil and gas business, and then split this into four divisions: exploration, production, enhanced oil recovery, and finance and administration. The company hoped that by focusing its resources, it could both cut costs and improve future earnings.

Occidental's next big move came in 1997. The company spent $3.65 billion to buy a huge oil field, the Naval Petroleum Reserve, from the U.S. government. The naval reserve, called Elk Hills, produced both oil and natural gas. The field, near Bakersfield, California, had been owned by the government since 1900, as a secure source of domestic oil. Deciding it no longer needed the source, the government auctioned the reserve in a deal that was the largest privatization in U.S. history. Occidental bought 78 percent of Elk Hills; the remainder was already owned by Chevron Corporation. To finance this purchase, Oxy decided to sell its MidCon unit, a huge natural gas pipeline the company operated between the Gulf and western states and Chicago. Oxy soon sold MidCon to KN Energy Inc. for almost $4 billion. The company also sold off various oil production units it judged unnecessary, including properties in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Wyoming. By mid-1998, Occidental had transformed itself into a much more focused company than it had been during Hammer's reign. It had five major oil and gas operations in the United States, including Elk Hills, which was thought to have huge growth potential. For international growth, the company counted on a blossoming oilfield it ran in Qatar. Only about one-third of Occidental was still invested in chemicals, freeing the company somewhat from the volatility of the chemical business cycle.

Occidental's efforts to realign its operations continued as it entered the 21st century. The process of becoming a more focused oil and gas company with large, long-lived oil and gas assets in three primary regions, the United States, the Middle East, and Latin America, meant Occidental needed both to add to its holdings and to strip away those interests deemed outside its new, refined business scope. At the close of the century, the company ended its involvement in Venezuela and the Dutch North Sea and traded its oil and gas interests in the Philippines and Malaysia for Royal Dutch/Shell interests in Yemen and Columbia. The divestitures made room for additions to the company's portfolio, such as the sale of its 29.2 percent interest in Canadian Occidental, which gave Occidental $700 million to complete an important acquisition in 2000. In April, the company purchased Altura Energy Ltd., the largest oil producer in Texas, with proved reserves of 850 million barrels of oil equivalent. The Altura acquisition was a massive deal, a $3.6 billion purchase that made Occidental the largest oil producer in Texas. The acquisition also added substantially to Occidental's debt, which exceeded $6 billion by the end of 2000.

As Occidental entered a new decade, Irani returned to one of Hammer's favorite haunts. When U.S. sanctions against Libya were lifted in the spring of 2004, Irani sent a negotiating team back to the country that had delivered one of Hammer's greatest successes. Occidental was producing 45,000 barrels of oil per day from three fields in 1986, when it was ordered to leave the country. After declaring he had given up his nuclear ambitions, Qaddafi auctioned off exploration rights in the oil-rich Libyan desert, and Irani's lieutenants were there to secure sizeable holdings for Occidental. Of the 15 blocks up for sale, Occidental acquired nine of them, paying dearly for the right to explore for oil. In early 2005, Occidental agreed to pay signing bonuses of $90 million, far more than any other bidder, and the company agreed to give as much as 89 percent of the hydrocarbons it found back to Libya. There were some industry analysts who wondered if Occidental had given up too much to renew its efforts in Libya, but the company was attracted by the easily accessible crude available in the North African desert. In the coming years, it was up to Irani to see if he could replicate Hammer's success and make Libya a major source of Occidental's oil.

Principal Subsidiaries

Centurion Pipeline GP, Inc; Centurion Pipeline LP, Inc.; Centurion Pipeline L.P.; D.S. Ventures, Inc.; Glenn Springs Holdings, Inc.; INDSPEC Chemical Corporation; INDSPEC Holding Corporation; INDSPEC Technologies, Ltd.; Laguna Petroleum Corporation; La Porte Chemicals Corp.; Occidental Andina, LLC; Occidental C.O.B. Partners; Occidental Chemical Chile Limitada; Occidental Chemical Corporation; Occidental Chemical Holding Corporation; Occidental Chemical Nevis, Inc.; Occidental Chile Investments, LLC; Occidental Crude Sales, Inc. (International); Occidental de Colombia, Inc.; Occidental del Ecuador, Inc.; Occidental Dolphin Holdings Ltd. (Bermuda); Occidental Energy Marketing, Inc.; Occidental Exploration and Production Company; Occidental International Holdings Ltd.; Occidental International Oil and Gas Ltd.; Occidental Mexico Holdings, Inc.; Occidental of Elk Hills, Inc.; Occidental of Oman, Inc.; Occidental Oil and Gas Holding Corporation; Occidental Oil and Gas Pakistan LLC; Occidental OOOI Holder, Inc.; Occidental Overseas Operations, Inc.; Occidental Peninsula, Inc.; Occidental Permian Ltd.; Occidental Petroleum (Pakistan), Inc.; Occidental Petroleum Investment Co.; Occidental Petroleum of Qatar Ltd.; Occidental Pipeline Holding Corporation; Occidental PVC LP, Inc.; Occidental Quimica do Brasil Ltda. (Brazil).

Principal Competitors

E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company; Exxon Mobil Corporation; Royal Dutch/Shell Group of Companies.

Further Reading

Brown, Christie, "The Master Cynic," Forbes, October 17, 1994, pp. 364-68.

Bryant, Adam, "At Occidental, So-So Results But Big Pay for the Boss," New York Times, March 19, 1998, pp. D1, D8.

Fan, Aliza, "Occidental Plans Broad Restructuring to Save Firm $100 Million per Year," Oil Daily, October 26, 1995, p. 1.

Fritsch, Peter, "Occidental Plans $3.65 Billion Purchase," Wall Street Journal, October 7, 1997, pp. A3, A6.

Glover, Kara, "Ray Irani Brings New Ways to Occidental," Los Angeles Business Journal, March 23, 1992, p. 12.

Hammer, Armand, and Neil Lyndon, Hammer, New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1987.

Helman, Christopher, "Oxy Moron?," Forbes, February 28, 2005, p. 46.

Marcial, Gene G., "To the Shores of Tripoli?," Business Week, February 16, 2004, p. 97.

"Occidental Awarded Nine Exploration Blocks in Libya," PrimeZone Media Network, January 31, 2005, p. 32.

"Oxy Chief Sees Return to Libya This Year," Oil Daily, January 25, 2005.

"Oxy Makeover Continues," International Petroleum Finance, August 2001, p. 14.

Rundle, Rhonda, "Occidental Acts to Pare Further Its 1993 Costs," Wall Street Journal, November 20, 1992, p. A3.

Shook, Barbara, "Chevron Settles with Oxy for $775 Million," Oil Daily, November 19, 1999, p. 31.

------, "Oxy Nears Emergence from Restructuring As Simpler Company with New Profile," Oil Daily, April 1, 1998, p. 62.

"'Treason' Ups Political Heat," LatAm Energy, October 6, 2004, p. 1.

Waldner, Erin, "Occidental Petroleum's Earnings Balloon in Fourth Quarter," Bakersfield Californian, January 25, 2005, p. B2.

Weinberg, Steve, Armand Hammer: The Untold Story, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1989.

— Mark Uri Toch

U.S. firm active in Libya.

Occidental Petroleum was a small, nearly bankrupt company when it was purchased in 1956 by Armand Hammer, a Russian-born American entrepreneur. Occidental won oil concessions in Libya during the 1965 bidding round and struck oil shortly afterward. Within two years, Occidental had become a major shipper of oil to Europe as a result of the abundance and quality of Libya's oil, and the closure of the Suez Canal during the Arab-Israel War of 1967.

Occidental's dependence on Libya made it a prime target for "the Libyan squeeze." The government of Muammar al-Qaddafi, who took over Libya in a bloodless coup in 1969, ordered Occidental to cut back production for refusing to agree to higher oil prices. Within three months, Hammer agreed to pay 30 cents more per barrel as well as a higher rate of taxes. Other companies followed his lead, touching off the oil price revolution of the early 1970s.

Although Occidental produced oil elsewhere, it kept its operations in Libya despite the nationalization in 1973 of 51 percent of its holdings. In 1985 Occidental sold 21 percent of its Libyan equity to the Austrian firm OMV.

In 1986 U.S. economic sanctions against Libya ordered all U.S. firms operating there to halt their activities. These sanctions were augmented in 1992 by U.N. sanctions imposed in retaliation for Libya's refusal to extradite two suspects in the December 1988 bombing of a Pan American flight over Lockerbie, Scotland. In 1999 U.N. sanctions were lifted, but two years later, the U.S. Congress voted to renew U.S. sanctions for five additional years. Despite Occidental's close ties with high-level members of the U.S. presidential administrations of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, it was unable to have Libya removed from the State Department's list of countries supporting international terrorism. The Clinton administration did allow Occidental to survey its abandoned production facilities in 1999. Despite its success in getting the Bush administration to expand its support for the drug war in Colombia (which, incidentally, protects its operations there), Occidental has been unable to get permission to resume operating in Libya. As the prospects for the return of U.S. oil companies to Libya continue to dim, Occidental risks the loss of its Libyan holdings. Should the Libyan government ever implement its September 2001 ultimatum that Occidental and the other four U.S. companies with oil interests in Libya resume operations there, they would face the revocation of their concessions.

Bibliography

Mobbs, Philip M. "The Mineral Industry of Libya - 2001." Available from http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals.

Rand, Christopher T. Making Democracy Safe for Oil: Oilmen and the Islamic East. Boston: Little, Brown, 1975.

Sampson, Anthony. The Seven Sisters: The Great Oil Companies and the World They Shaped. New York: Viking, 1975.

Tétreault, Mary Ann. Revolution in the World Petroleum Market. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1985.

— MARY ANN TÉTREAULT

Occidental Petroleum Corporation

Type	Public (NYSE: OXY) S&P 500 Component
Industry	Oil and gas
Founded	1920
Headquarters	Los Angeles, California
Key people	Ray R. Irani (Executive Chairman)[1] Stephen I. Chazen (President and CEO)[1]
Products	Oil, Natural gas, Petrochemicals
Revenue	US$ 19.16 billion (2010)[2]
Net income	US$ 4.53 billion (2010)[2]
Employees	11,000 (2010)[3]
Website	www.oxy.com

Occidental Petroleum headquarters in Westwood, Los Angeles, California

Occidental Petroleum Corporation (Oxy) is a California-based oil and gas exploration and production company with operations in the United States, the Middle East, North Africa, and South America. Its headquarters are in Westwood, Los Angeles.^[4][5]

"Oxy" is the largest oil producer in Texas and the largest natural gas producer and third-largest producer of oil in California,^[6] with additional operations in Kansas, North Dakota, Utah, Oklahoma, Colorado and New Mexico.^[7] The company nickname began in 1964 in reference to Occidental’s NYSE stock ticker (OXY). Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, Oxy is the fourth-largest U.S. oil and gas company, based on equity market capitalization. As of 2010, the company has more than 30,000 employees and contractors worldwide.^[3]

Oxy's role in oil and natural gas exploration and production, to which they have pledged a commitment to responsibility, has also been a source of criticism. The company states that it is "committed to respecting the environment, protecting safety and upholding high standards of social responsibility throughout its worldwide operations."^[8] Critics have raised concerns about Occidental's historical operations in these areas.

Oxy’s subsidiaries include wholly owned chemical manufacturers Occidental Chemical Corporation (OxyChem), OxyVinyls, and INDSPEC Chemical Corporation. Oxy indirectly owns Armand Products Company with Church & Dwight Co., Inc.. Carbocloro S.A. Indústrias Químicas, is a joint venture between OxyChem and UNIPAR in Brazil.

Contents 1 History 2 Financial performance 3 Operations 3.1 Oil and gas 3.2 Chemical 3.3 Oil shale 3.4 Phibro 4 Corporate social responsibility 4.1 Libya 4.2 Environmental record 4.2.1 Love Canal 4.2.2 Colombia 4.2.2.1 Caño Limón 4.2.3 Maynas Carijano v. Occidental Petroleum 4.3 Political record 4.3.1 Greenmail 4.3.2 Gore family 4.4 Safety record 4.4.1 Piper Alpha 5 Businesses 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

History

Occidental was founded in 1920. In 1957, Dr. Armand Hammer was elected president and CEO. In 1961, the company discovered the Lathrop Gas Field in the Arbuckle area of the Sacramento basin at Lathrop.^[9] Over the next 10 years, Occidental expanded internationally with operations in Libya, Peru, Venezuela, Bolivia, Trinidad, and the United Kingdom. Occidental won exploration rights in Libya in 1965 and operated there until all activities were suspended in 1986 after the United States imposed economic sanctions on Libya. On July 6, 1988, an explosion and subsequent inferno on the Piper Alpha platform, operated by Occidental Petroleum (Caledonia) Ltd in the UK North Sea, resulted in 167 fatalities in what remains the world's most deadly offshore disaster.^[10]

Occidental entered the chemical business with the acquisition of Hooker Chemicals in 1968, 26 years after the contamination at Love Canal. Today, Dallas-based Occidental Chemical is a leading chemical manufacturer with interests in basic chemicals, vinyls and performance chemical products.^[11]

In 1990, Dr. Ray R. Irani became Occidental Petroleum Corporation's Chairman and CEO. He held the additional title of President from 2005 to 2007. Occidental Petroelum’s compensation policies came under scrutiny in 2007 after it was announced that CEO, Ray Irani, collected $460 million in stock shares and salary in 2006.^[12] In May 2011, Irani retired as CEO after the California State Teachers' Retirement System and Relational Investors, two major institutional Occidental Investors, objected to the company's compensation policies for top executives.^[13] President Stephen Chazen was named CEO of Occidental to replace Irani who stayed on as executive Chairman until 2014.^[14] Since 1990, Occidental has gone from a collection of unrelated businesses to one that focuses on oil and gas.^[15] During Irani's tenure as CEO, Occidental’s market capitalization increased to more than $80 billion from $5.4 billion.^[16]

In 2005, Occidental was among 53 entities which contributed the maximum of $250,000 to the second inauguration of President George W. Bush.^[17][18][19] In 2008, Oxy contributed $301,579 to Democratic candidates and $204,587 to Republican candidates.^[20]

Financial performance

At year-end 2010, Occidental was the fourth-largest U.S. oil and gas company measured by market capitalization, with a market capitalization of $79.7 billion at that date.^[21] This represented a fifteenfold increase in the company's market capitalization since the end of 1990, when it was approximately $5.4 billion.^[22] At year-end 2010, Occidental was ranked No. 33 on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index.^[23] Shares of Occidental rose by nearly 21 percent in 2010, compared with a 12 percent increase in the Chicago Board Options Exchange index of oil companies.^[24]

Occidental Petroleum Financial Performance

Fiscal year	Market capitalization (billions)[21]	Revenue (billions)[2]	Income before income taxes (loss)(billions)[2]
2005	$32.112	$16.259	$7.133
2006	$41.070	$18.160	$7.830
2007	$63.794	$20.013	$8.572
2008	$48.585	$24.480	$11.371
2009	$66.050	$15.531	$4.669
2010	$79.735	$19.157	$7.359

Operations

Oil and gas

Occidental’s growth strategy in oil and gas relies on three components: enhanced oil recovery (EOR), exploration and acquisitions. Occidental’s oil and gas operations are focused in three core areas, the United States, the Middle East/North Africa, and South America. Occidental had approximately 3.36 billion barrels (534,000,000 m³) of oil equivalent net proved reserves at December 31, 2010.^[25] In 2010, the company had its highest annual daily sales volume in history – 748,000 barrels (118,900 m³) of oil equivalent.^[26]

The United States accounted for 66 percent of Occidental's oil and gas reserves and 51 percent of the current production in 2010.^[27] Occidental is the largest producer of natural gas and third-largest producer of oil in California, where in 2009 it made what is believed to be the largest oil and natural gas discovery in the state in 35 years.^[28] It also operates the THUMS Islands in the San Pedro Bay. Occidental's total share of oil and gas 2010 production in California was approximately 139,000-barrel (22,100 m³) of oil equivalent per day and its properties held approximately 768-million-barrel (122,100,000 m³) of oil equivalent in proved reserves.^[7]

Occidental also has significant oil and natural gas holdings in the Permian Basin of West Texas and Southeast New Mexico. Occidental is the largest oil producer in the Permian Basin,^[29] where it produced roughly 197,000 barrels (31,300 m³) of oil equivalent per day in 2010 and held 1.2 billion barrels (190,000,000 m³) of proved reserves as of December 31, 2010.^[30][31] In the Permian Basin, Oxy is the largest operator of EOR oil projects that inject carbon dioxide into underground formations to extract the oil and gas that remains after primary recovery operations.^[32] In 2010, the company’s 31 CO₂ projects produced nearly 85,000 barrels (13,500 m³) of oil per day as a result of EOR, according to Oil & Gas Journal’s biennial EOR survey.^[33]

Occidental’s Mid-Continent Gas operations are concentrated in the Permian Basin, Kansas, Colorado, Utah and Oklahoma. These operations produced approximately 62,000 barrels (9,900 m³) of oil equivalent per day in 2010 and had proved reserves of 266 million barrels (42,300,000 m³) of oil equivalent, as of December 31, 2010.^[7] In 2010, Oxy announced the acquisition of new shale oil properties in Williston Basin in North Dakota as well as natural gas and oil properties in South Texas.^[34][35]

Occidental’s Middle East and North Africa operations accounted for 38 percent of its worldwide production in 2010, producing approximately 287,500 barrels (45,710 m³) of oil equivalent.^[27] The region also holds 26 percent of the company’s proved reserves. In the Middle East, Occidental has operations in Libya, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Iraq and Yemen.^[7][27] Oxy is the second-largest oil producer in Oman.^[36] In Qatar, it is a partner in the giant Dolphin natural gas project, which delivers gas to Oman and the United Arab Emirates.^[37][38] The company has its only operation in North Africa in Libya. In 2005, Occidental and partner Liwa won eight out of 15 exploration spots on the EPSA-4 auction, making both companies among the first to enter the Libyan market since the United States lifted its embargo on that country. In early 2011, Occidental won a contract to join Abu Dhabi’s state oil company in developing the Shah natural-gas project, one of the largest natural gas fields in the Middle East.^[39]

In South America, Occidental operates in Bolivia and Colombia. Occidental’s share of production from its Colombia assets was approximately 32,000 barrels (5,100 m³) of oil per day in 2010.^[7] In Colombia, Occidental and Ecopetrol, the state-owned oil company, discovered the giant Caño Limón oilfield in 1983. It proved to be the largest discovery in Colombia’s oil history and helped return the country to the oil-exporter status.^[40]

In 2010, Occidental announced the sale of its oil and gas operations in Argentina to Sinopec, a subsidiary of China Petrochemical Corporation; the transaction was completed in early 2011.^[41] Occidental formerly operated in Ecuador, but the government ended the company's interests in block 15 in the Ecuadorian Amazon in 2006.^[42]

Chemical

Oxy’s subsidiaries include wholly owned chemical manufacturers Occidental Chemical Corporation (OxyChem), OxyVinyls, and INDSPEC Chemical Corporation. OxyChem is a Dallas, Texas-based manufacturer of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) resins, chlorine and caustic soda used in plastics, pharmaceuticals and water treatment chemicals. Other products manufactured by the company include caustic potash, chlorinated organics, sodium silicates, chlorinated isocyanurates and calcium chloride. OxyChem has manufacturing facilities in the United States, Canada, Chile and Brazil.^[7]

Through joint ventures, Oxy indirectly owns Armand Products Company, with OxyChem and Church & Dwight Co., Inc., which sells potassium carbonate and potassium bicarbonate. Carbocloro S.A. Indústrias Químicas, a joint venture between OxyChem and UNIPAR, manufactures and sells chlor-alkali products in Brazil.^[43]

On October 11, 2008, an accidental spill of oleum, a chemical similar to sulfuric acid, occurred at INDSPEC’s facility in Petrolia, Pennsylvania. The accident caused contamination of the ventilation system and a cloud of toxic gas in the Petrolia sky. 2,500 residents of the area were asked to evacuate.^[44]

Oil shale

Starting in 1972, Occidental Oil Shale, Inc., a subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum, began research on a shale oil extraction process, ending research in 1991.^[45][46] The company conducted the first modified in situ oil shale experiment in 1972 at Logan Wash, Colorado.^[46] The process used explosives to create underground chambers (retorts) of fractured oil shale. About 20% was mined out after which blasting was used to fracture oil shale. The commercial-sized retort covered 333 by 166 feet (101 by 51 m) area and had height of 400 feet (120 m). Oil shale was then ignited on the top by external fuel and air or steam was injected to control the process. As a result, combustion moved from the top to the bottom of retort.^[47]

During the process four major zones could be identified. In the pre-heat zone air contacted processed hot shale (spent shale) which pre-heated air. In the combustion zone, oxygen in air was used to burn carbon residue in the spent shale. Below this zone, heated gas caused retorting process converting kerogen in oil shale to oil shale gas and shale oil vapors. In the final zone oil and gas were cooled and collected through separation sump and collecting well.^[47][48] All together, six retorts have been burned at the site.^[49]

Phibro

CFO Stephen Chazen led Occidental's October 12, 2009 acquisition of Citigroup's controversial Phibro energy-trading business, paying $250 million for the unit and the services of Phibro chief Andrew J. Hall. Hall’s compensation of $100 million in 2009 was seen as a problem for troubled Citibank which struggled with continuing losses before selling the unit. So far the Occidental-owned Phibro has had mixed results. Occidental suffered significant trading losses in 2010, causing the company to fall short of analyst expectations, and landed in the red again in the second quarter of 2011 despite Chazen’s public support of Hall.^{[50] [51]}

Corporate social responsibility

Occidental's role in oil and natural gas exploration and production has also been a source of criticism. The company states that it is "committed to respecting the environment, maintaining safety and upholding high standards of social responsibility throughout the company's worldwide operations."^[52] Critics have raised concerns about Occidental's historical operations in these areas.

Occidental Petroleum is a signatory participant of the Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights.

Libya

Occidental Petroleum began operations in Libya in 1965 and operated there until U.S. sanctions were imposed in 1986 by President Ronald Reagan and was one of the first American company to resume negotiations in Libya after U.S. sanctions were lifted in 2004.^[53] Subsequently, Occidental Petroleum, along with five other oil companies, has been criticized for lobbying to exempt Libya from a law written by U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) to assist American terror victims in seizing assets of countries found culpable in terror attacks, such as the Libyan bombing of the Pan Am flight in Lockerbie in 1988.^[54] In 2008, the company hired Hogan & Hartson, a Washington, D.C., law firm as its lobbyist.^[55] In 2011, Oxy ceased exploration activities and production operations due to the growing civil unrest in the country and newly imposed U.S. sanctions.

In June 2011, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) requested information from Occidental, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips related to the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA), an investment firm controlled by Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi.^[56] United Kingdom prosecutors, in cooperation with the SEC, have undertaken similar investigations of multiple oil companies during this same period to determine if there were any violations of international bribery laws.^[57] The Libyan Investment Authority’s investments were frozen by the U.S. government in early 2011 following the Qaddafi regime’s attacks on Libyan civilians.^[58]

Environmental record

Oxy has been noted within the oil and gas industry as being among the first to employ carbon dioxide (CO2) injection for enhanced oil recovery; this technique is a means of long-term geologic storage of CO2, which could reduce future greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere.^[59][60]

Occidental was recognized by the EPA in 2008 as Production Partner of the Year and in 2009 for Continuing Excellence (5 Years).^[61] Occidental is a member of the Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC). The WHC has certified the habitat conservation and education programs^[62][63][64] at eight of the company's sites.^[65]

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst identified Occidental Petroleum as the 47th-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, with about 1.2 million pounds of toxic chemicals released annually into the air.^[66] Pollutants emitted by the company included chlorine, antimony compounds, benzotrichloride, and hydrochloric acid.^{[citation needed]}

Love Canal

Further information: Love Canal

In 1942, Hooker Chemical and Plastics began disposing chemical waste in the Love Canal region. Other companies as well as the military had used it as a chemical disposal site since the 1920s. In 1947, Hooker Chemicals became the owner and the sole user of the land. In 1952, the site was filled to capacity and closed off. Later in the 1950s, the local school board requested Hooker, after threatening to resort to eminent domain, to sell the land. The school board intended to build a school on an unused area of the dump. Hooker Chemical sold the land to the school board at $1, with the warning that the site contained waste products from the manufacturing of chemicals, and disclaimed all subsequent liability.

A school was built on the site, and later a middle-class residential district was built upon the land adjacent to the site. The construction broke through the 4-foot (1.2 m) clay seal containing the waste. In 1968, Hooker Chemical was purchased by Occidental Petroleum. In 1978, residents became concerned about unusual health issues in the Love Canal region, including high rates of cancer and birth defects. This subsequently became a national news story, and in 1980, president Jimmy Carter declared a federal emergency in the area. Residents were eventually relocated, and Occidental paid $129 million in restitution.^[67]

Colombia

Occidental met with substantial resistance from 1992 to 2001 when it tried to drill for oil in the territory of the U'wa people in northeast Colombia. The locals were concerned about environmental damage and feared that development would bring strangers and invite violence to the region. There also were tribal beliefs that oil is the "blood of the earth" and should not be removed. They believed that oil infrastructure would be a target for violent leftist guerillas in the country. After years of shareholder resolutions, legal battles, protests, and a failed test well, the company abandoned the project. Repsol YPF took over the project and continues to work on it.

Caño Limón

Further information: Caño Limón – Coveñas pipeline

On December 13, 1998, seventeen civilians, including 7 children, were killed when the Colombian Air Force dropped a cluster bomb in the hamlet of Santo Domingo, Colombia, after AirScan, Occidental's security contractor, from a private aircraft, incorrectly identified it as a hostile guerrilla target. Groups such as FARC and the National Liberation Army were active in the area. Three employees of AirScan were flying the Skymaster plane from which they provided the Colombian military with the coordinates to drop the bombs. The operation had been planned by the CAF and AirScan at the Occidental's complex in Caño Limón.^[68] A lawsuit was attempted in April 2003 against Occidental by Luis Alberto Galvis Mujica, a witness and survivor of the accident.^[69] Plaintiffs claims were dismissed by the trial court.^[70][71] The dismissal was appealed to 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which sent the back case to the trial court to resolve a single issue.^[72] The trial court declined to reconsider the case, thereby reinstating the dismissal. The case is once again on appeal.^[73]

Maynas Carijano v. Occidental Petroleum

On May 10, 2007, a group of 25 indigenous Achuar Peruvians filed suit against Occidental, demanding clean-up and reparations for environmental damages allegedly caused by Occidental over 30 years. The plaintiffs claimed that the company violated the industry standards and the environmental regulations by dumping a total of 9 billion barrels (1.4×10^⁹ m³) of toxic oil by-products in watersheds used by the Achuar people to fish, drink, and bathe. The Achuar were represented by Los Angeles-based EarthRights International and the law firm Schonbrun DeSimone Seplow Harris & Hoffman LLP.^[74]

On March 3, 2010, EarthRights International (ERI) argued to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the landmark environmental and public health case brought by indigenous Peruvian Achuar and the U.S. NGO Amazon Watch against Los Angeles-based oil giant Occidental Petroleum (Oxy), Maynas Carijano v. Occidental Petroleum, should be litigated in Los Angeles, where Oxy is headquartered. The appeals court will be deciding whether the oil giant will face suit in its own hometown or whether the case will move to Peru.^[75]

Political record

Greenmail

In 1984, David Murdock owned about 5% of the company's shares. When Murdock called on the management to take measures to increase the share price, it chose to pay greenmail to buy back shares from him at $40.10, while the market price was $28.75.

Gore family

Occidental's coal interests were represented for many years by attorney and former U.S. Senator Albert Gore, Sr., among others. Gore, who had a long-time close friendship with Hammer, became the head of the subsidiary Island Creek Coal Company, upon his election loss in the Senate. Much of Occidental's coal and phosphate production was in Tennessee, the state Gore represented in the Senate, and Gore owned shares in the company. Former Vice President Albert Gore, Jr. received much criticism from environmentalists, when the shares passed to the estate after the death of Albert Gore Sr., and Albert Gore Jr. was a son and the executor of the estate.^[76][77] Albert Gore Jr. did not exercise control over the shares, which were eventually sold when the estate closed.^[78][79]

In 1998, the US government sold the Elk Hills naval petroleum reserve to Occidental for $3.65 billion. According to the government, the reserve was no longer strategically necessary, and the reserve was sold to reduce the national debt and the size of the government. To ensure competition, the field was sold in segments and offered to multiple bidders.^[80] Critics cited Vice President Al Gore's involvement with the company as evidence of graft.^[76]

Safety record

OxyChem has achieved Star Status under OSHA’s Voluntary Protection Programs as being among the safest work sites in the U.S.^[81][82]

Piper Alpha

Further information: Piper Alpha

On July 6, 1988 Occidental's Piper Alpha offshore production platform in the UK North Sea was destroyed when an out of service gas condensate pump was started with its pressure safety valve removed. The subsequent gas leak, explosion and fire resulted in the deaths of 167 workers in what remains the world's most deadly offshore disaster.

Businesses

• Occidental Oil & Gas Corporation
• Occidental Chemical Corporation (OxyChem)

See also

• List of petroleum companies

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