The Corrib Gasline

international | anti-capitalism | opinion/analysis Wednesday November 09, 2005 18:34 by Henry

A little deductive logic

Let us conduct a little logical analysis of Shell's motives at Rossport:

(1) Shell is spending its own money on the Corrib pipeline.
(2) The protests are holding up construction of the pipeline meaning Shell is losing money.
(3) Suppose Shell as the protestors claim are in fact building a pipeline which is in danger of exploding.
(4) Surely then if then Shell would be ensuring that keeping in mind the supposedly high risk of an explosion that they would not only lose the money lost due to the delay caused by the protests but also the larger costs in building the pipeline in the first place.
(5) If Shell were foolish this would be the case.
(6) However Shell has been involved in the gas and oil business for decades and it stands to reason that business people with this expertise would be motivated to build a pipeline that would be unlikely to explode in order to secure their investment.
(7) It is therefore more likely that the pipeline would in fact be safely constructed.
(8) Therefore the protestors are more than likely mistaken that the pipeline is dangerous.