Chevron operates a major refinery in Richmond, Calif., a community with high childhood asthma rates. It also owns the city’s dominant news site, putting its own spin on events, and runs similar websites in Texas and Ecuador.
Tracy J. Lee for NPR
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Tracy J. Lee for NPR
Chevron operates a major refinery in Richmond, Calif., a community with high childhood asthma rates. It also owns the city’s dominant news site, putting its own spin on events, and runs similar websites in Texas and Ecuador.
Tracy J. Lee for NPR
NPR’s David Folkenflik reported this story with Miranda Green of Floodlight, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates the powerful interests stalling climate action.
RICHMOND, Calif. — Open flames shot upward from four smokestacks at the Chevron refinery on the western edge of Richmond, Calif. Soon, black smoke blanketed the sky.
News spread quickly that day last November, but by word of mouth, says Denny Khamphanthong, a 29-year-old Richmond resident. “We don’t know the full story, but we know that you shouldn’t breathe in the air or be outside for that matter,” Khamphanthong says now. “It would be nice to have an actual news outlet that would actually go out there and figure it out themselves.”
The city’s primary local news source, The Richmond Standard, didn’t cover the flare. Nor had it reported on a 2021 Chevron refinery pipeline rupture that dumped nearly 800 gallons of diesel fuel into San Francisco Bay.
Chevron is the city’s largest employer, largest taxpayer and largest polluter. Yet when it comes to writing about Chevron, The Richmond Standard consistently toes the company line.
And there’s a reason for that: Chevron owns The Richmond Standard.
“If you look at Chevron’s website and you look at The Richmond Standard, a lot of the information is copy and paste,” says Katt Ramos, a local climate activist. “They present a very skewed viewpoint that is bought and paid for by Chevron.”
The site’s very name evokes the history of Chevron, created when John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil was broken up by federal trust-busters more than a century ago.
The Richmond Standard prides itself on being the “number one source for local, community-driven news” about the city.
The city of Richmond exists in the shadow of the nearby Chevron refinery, which has been connected to poor air quality and health issues in the nearby community.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
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Brian L. Frank for NPR
The city of Richmond exists in the shadow of the nearby Chevron refinery, which has been connected to poor air quality and health issues in the nearby community.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Around town, in coffee shops, an architect’s office, at a Mexican restaurant, even at a waterside National Park Service site, the Standard is recognized as the main source of news about the city. It carries stories about charity drives and street closings. New bars and art exhibits. Youth soccer events and local concerts and safety initiatives.
Decades ago, the city relied on the Richmond Independent and the San Francisco Chronicle to report on the community. And then a pattern familiar across the U.S. unfolded. The Chronicle pulled back. The Independent got folded into a newspaper in nearby Berkeley, which itself shut down in 1984. Papers in other East Bay cities shriveled up. Now the city’s news landscape is dominated by its major corporate force.
Markets where news outlets shut down are often called news deserts. The Standard has created something of a news mirage: Stories are told — but with an agenda. Facts displeasing to Chevron are omitted; hard truths softened. The company is seeking to get its point of view across and to convey that it can be trusted.
On a recent February night, a city council meeting focused repeatedly on developments involving Chevron. Not a single journalist attended in person — other than those for NPR and Floodlight.
The same San Francisco public relations firm that operates the Standard for Chevron runs a similar site about developments in the Permian Basin in West Texas and New Mexico, where Chevron has major business interests.
It also runs one of the company’s sites in Ecuador, where the energy giant has fought back decades of litigation.
The Richmond Standard is a local news site funded by Chevron, which runs the large refinery in town.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
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Brian L. Frank for NPR
The Richmond Standard is a local news site funded by Chevron, which runs the large refinery in town.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Chevron’s bid to control the public discourse comes as efforts to combat climate change threaten the fossil fuel industry, especially in California. State regulators would effectively ban the sales of gas-powered cars by 2035. They released the world’s first plan to achieve net-zero carbon pollution. Other states and countries have adopted similar goals.
In February, Chevron revealed that it was taking a loss of about $1.8 billion on assets mainly in California, because of a tougher regulatory climate in the state. Chevron’s corporate headquarters is in San Ramon, about a 35-mile drive southeast of Richmond, though the company has moved the bulk of its workforce to Texas.
“The company saw a need to offer the community more news coverage of Richmond, which had been largely ignored by traditional media with the exception of crime stories,” said Braden Reddall, a manager of external affairs at Chevron. “Most people in Richmond will tell you there is a lot more to the community than what is known and reported by traditional media outlets. It’s a proud community, filled with interesting people who are doing interesting things.”
Other outlets more than adequately cover Chevron, added Reddall, who earlier covered the company for the international news service Reuters.
Former schoolteacher Patricia Dornan says she reads The Richmond Standard but skips the stories about Chevron. “I don’t read any of the articles about how wonderful their company is,” she says.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
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Brian L. Frank for NPR
Former schoolteacher Patricia Dornan says she reads The Richmond Standard but skips the stories about Chevron. “I don’t read any of the articles about how wonderful their company is,” she says.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Lifelong Richmond resident Patricia Dornan says she cherry-picks which stories she reads in the Standard.
“If you understand that it’s going to have a Chevron-Standard Oil point of view, it’s fine because most of the stuff that they’re putting out has nothing to do with them,” says Dornan, a retired middle school teacher. “And so long as it doesn’t have to do with Chevron, it’s fine. I don’t read any of the articles about how wonderful their company is.”
Dornan volunteers at the Rosie the Riveter World War II Home Front National Historical Park. She tells visitors about the marvels of American manufacturing in a time of war and about the women welders of Richmond who were able to turn out warships in 51 days rather than two years.
Her grandmother moved to town in 1905 — just three years after the refinery first opened — and her family has been there ever since. One of the streets in town is named after her father. She says Richmond can’t function without Chevron, but a true local news outlet would help hold it accountable to the community.
When she wants to know what Chevron is up to, Dornan says, “I usually ask my friends who are retirees from the refinery — what’s going on?”
“Richmond deserves more news coverage”
When the Standard launched in 2014, it proclaimed: “Richmond deserves more news coverage.”
“For the first time in more than 30 years, Richmond will have a community-driven daily news source dedicated to shining a light on the positive things that are going on in the community,” the site announced.
Chevron presents the Standard as an investment in the Richmond community. The public relations firm operating the Standard wrote, “This site would tell the stories other outlets had lost the resources to tell.”
But not all of the stories.
A recent review found The Richmond Standard had published 434 stories that touch on its owner, Chevron, since the site’s inception. Eight articles refer to flaring incidents. None cite oil spills. The majority of the stories that mention Chevron focus on profiles, awards ceremonies, community projects and celebrations it throws on such occasions as Black History and Hispanic Heritage months.
When Bay Area air pollution regulators secured landmark concessions from Chevron in February to settle a lawsuit, they called it a “decisive victory.” The San Jose Mercury News headline cited “$20 million in fines for hundreds of air-quality violations.”
The Richmond Standard was more reserved: “Chevron agreement with Air District called win for environment and energy.”
The article did not clearly lay out the core of the litigation. The words “fine” and “penalty” did not appear. Careful readers might have been able to piece together what transpired: The news outlet described an agreement involving $20 million that “solidifies the future of energy production at the Richmond Refinery.”
“There are a whole host of news outlets around the Bay Area that cover the refinery,” said Reddall, the Chevron spokesperson. “The Standard seeks to fill in the gaps.
“I don’t think that it’s a refinery that’s not written about.”
Richmond is a working-class city of 115,000 — nearly half of whom are Latino. Most of the people who work at the Chevron refinery live outside the city.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
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Brian L. Frank for NPR
Richmond is a working-class city of 115,000 — nearly half of whom are Latino. Most of the people who work at the Chevron refinery live outside the city.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
A news mirage
Boundaries blur between city and corporation in this largely working-class city of 115,000 people, almost half of whom are Latino. The tech boom of nearby Silicon Valley and the opulence of neighboring Marin County feel like universes away.
The public high school’s mascot is the Oilers. Streets are named Ammonia and Petrolite and Xylene. Chevron’s network of pipes, low-lying cooling ponds and even sulfuric stench have become defining parts of the town’s character. A nature park where tufted egrets and hummingbirds frolic abuts the nearly 3,000-acre refinery itself — an expansive preserve of smokestacks, pipelines and tanks.
Chevron, which recorded $21.3 billion in profits last year, has played an outsized role in Richmond for decades. It supplies the city with jobs — yet most Chevron employees live elsewhere. It pays roughly $50 million a year to Richmond — more than a sixth of the town’s annual revenue.
The company’s relationship with Richmond turned sour rather abruptly in 2012. An explosion at the refinery injured 19 employees. The air pollution from the resulting industrial fire could be seen from miles away. In the ensuing days, 15,000 Bay Area residents went to medical centers for respiratory complications.
The Richmond High School mascot is the Oilers.
Brian L.
The Richmond High School mascot is the Oilers.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Brian L. Frank for NPR
The Richmond High School mascot is the Oilers.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
State and local prosecutors charged Chevron with criminal negligence and other crimes; the company settled by pleading no contest to six charges, paying out roughly $10 million to affected local residents, agencies and hospitals. Chevron also paid $5 million directly to the city of Richmond to settle a separate civil lawsuit.
By the time of the incident, political sentiment in Richmond started to swing away from the company. As the months passed, progressives were threatening to take control of the city government. They promoted a future without the refinery — just as Chevron was seeking approval from city officials for a sweeping project to overhaul and modernize it.
As the 2014 election cycle dawned, Chevron took action to make sure its voice was heard. It promised a huge investment in scholarships and public health programs.
Chevron also spent $3 million to help propel pro-industry candidates. They all lost. “The election became a referendum on Chevron,” said Tom Butt, at the time a city council member who won election as mayor.
Chevron also launched The Richmond Standard that year.
From the outset, the company disclosed its involvement. In small letters at the top of its homepage, the site reads “Funded by Chevron.”
Tom Butt was elected mayor of Richmond in 2014. He says that election was a referendum on Chevron.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Brian L. Frank for NPR
Tom Butt was elected mayor of Richmond in 2014. He says that election was a referendum on Chevron.
Brian L. Frank for NPR
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