Commitment to Communities

ConocoPhillips is committed to supporting programs that enhance the marine environment and bring long-term benefits to China.

We actively support programs focused on preserving and protecting the Bohai Sea environment and communities along the Bohai Economic Rim.

These programs focus on:

  • Sustainable fishing
  • Pollution reduction
  • Wetlands conservation
  • Water quality improvement
  • Marine ecosystem protection and risk management in the Bohai Sea area

ConocoPhillips continues to meet with Chinese experts from universities, non-profits and international organizations to discuss current and possible future projects.

We have developed a range of new initiatives across the communities near our China operational bases in the Bohai Sea. ConocoPhillips places health, safety and environmental stewardship at the top of our operating priorities.

Click on the links to the left to learn about some of the environmental initiatives that ConocoPhillips is supporting in China.

Commitment to Communities

Please see the sections for more information.

Bohai Sea Environmental Conservation Projects

Bohai Sea Fishery Resources and Habitats

As part of the agreement signed with the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) in January 2012 following the spill, RMB 100 million (approx. US $16 million) was allocated to improve fishery resources and the marine fishery environment. The MOA administers the funds and is responsible for developing appropriate programs.

Bohai Sea Marine Ecological Protection

As part of the agreement signed with the State Oceanic Administration (SOA) in April 2012 following the spill, RMB 113 million (approx. US $18 million) was designated to support projects for marine ecological protection in Bohai Sea. Initial programs focus on improving marine ecological protection, reducing pollutants, and studying long-term ecological influence in the Sea. The SOA administers the funds and is responsible for developing appropriate programs.

For more information, please visit the relevant regional MOA/SOA websites at:

Commitment to Bohai Sea and other Communities in China

Conservation for the Crane Flyway from the Hulunbeier Steppe to the Bohai Sea

CranesOver the past decade, the International Crane Foundation (ICF) has worked with local partners along eastern China’s crane flyways to conserve cranes and the wetland and grassland ecosystems on which they depend. Since April 2012, ConocoPhillips has invested RMB 3.7 million (approx. US $600,000) working with the ICF in two at-risk areas:

  • Northeast Inner Mongolia and adjacent parts of Jilin Province, where variable rainfall, water diversions and climate change have threatened crane habitats;
  • The coastal plain along the Bohai Sea, where development has put a strain on wetland ecosystems to the detriment of water birds and local communities dependent on wetland resources.

Northeast China, with adjacent parts of far eastern Russia and Inner Mongolia, supports six species of crane, the greatest diversity of cranes on earth. Four of these species are threatened with extinction, including the critically endangered Siberian crane and the endangered red-crowned crane, a symbol of good fortune and long life across East Asia. Wetlands of this region provide a breeding habitat for most of the world’s red-crowned, white-naped and hooded cranes, and an essential stopover habitat for almost all the world’s Siberian cranes.

Since the 1980s, ICF has emphasized a flyway approach to crane and waterfowl conservation, facilitating communication and coordinated activities involving wetland sites along the crane flyways in China, and also north into Mongolia and Russia.

For more information about the project, please click here or visit the International Crane Foundation’s website at savingcranes.org.  

China Environmental Stewardship Awards

In November 2013, ConocoPhillips began collaborating with the Institute of International Education (IIE) to establish the China Environmental Stewardship (CES) Awards.

Funded by ConocoPhillips and administered by the IIE, the CES Awards provide financial assistance to promising graduate students and their academic advisors at Chinese universities for study, research and training in the fields of environmental protection, risk management and sustainable development. ConocoPhillips has invested RMB 3.7 million (approx. US $600,000) for the first three years of the program. Four to six multi-year awards will be offered each year. In addition to providing direct financial support for the study, research and training plans of each CES awardee, the program also provides networking and leadership development opportunities to all program participants. 

In 2014 and 2015, ten winners received the award.

For more information on the CES Awards, please visit IIE’s website.

Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots

Roots & ShootsThe Jane Goodall Institute reaches out to young people, from primary to university level through the Roots & Shoots Environmental Education Program. From 2013 to 2015, ConocoPhillips invested RMB 3.3 million (approx. US $530,000) to support two key Roots & Shoots projects: the Clear Water Education Project and the Migrant Children Environmental Education Project (MCEE).

Clear Water empowers students to actively learn and find solutions to protect their local wetlands through mapping out ecological changes.  It has now expanded to cover schools from Beijing to the Bohai Sea area, allowing teachers to link Clear Water map projects to their science curricula, resulting in a positive effect on local communities.

MCEE’s impact is holistic in introducing and integrating environmental awareness into the curricula of migrant school that lack a science component due to constrained resources.

The Love & Hope Project

The Love & Hope ProjectThe Love & Hope Project was developed by the China Association of Social Workers (CASW) and the TEDA International Cardiovascular Hospital (TICH) of Tianjin to fund heart surgery for two- to 14-year-old children born with heart conditions or who suffer from heart disease. The project is specifically aimed at orphans and children from severely deprived families.

Between 2008 and 2015, ConocoPhillips donated RMB 5.75 million (approx. US $1 million) to fund heart surgery for about 400 severely underprivileged children born with congenital heart disease.  In addition to donations, the company’s Employee Volunteer Committee frequently calls on employees to visit children receiving treatment at the hospital. 

Light & Love School

The Light & Love School is a non-profit school providing education, accommodation and psychological guidance for orphaned, severely underprivileged and homeless children in migrant communities in Beijing.  ConocoPhillips has supported the school through financial donations and employee volunteer services since 2005.

Through 2015, recordable donations to the school reached a total of over RMB 6 million (approx. US $980,000). These funds facilitated the development of a permanent school campus to house over 100 students with classrooms, dormitories, education, medical care and other needed facilities. So far, over 700 children have benefited from this program.

Heart to Heart Project

In October 2013, ConocoPhillips signed an agreement with Children’s HeartLink, a non-profit organization based in the United States, to increase access to treatment for children with congenital heart disease at the West China Hospital of Sichuan University in Chengdu, China.

Under the agreement, ConocoPhillips provided RMB 1.87 million (approx. US $305,000) to Children’s HeartLink to support a three-year program to increase the capacity of the hospital’s pediatric cardiac unit to treat and care for more children with congenital heart disease. The program focuses on increasing the number of pediatric cardiology and critical care staff by setting up training systems for pediatric cardiologists and cardiac intensive care physicians, as well as the creation of a comprehensive and specialized pediatric cardiac center. It also supports the hospital’s development as a regional training center, enabling it to reach a greater number of children by enhancing the expertise of more medical professionals.

Children’s HeartLink has been working in partnership with West China Hospital since 2006 to promote sustainable cardiac care for children with congenital heart disease in China.

Tanggu Xiangyu Autistic Home

Our employees engage in a wide range of voluntary community work wherever we operate. The work our employees did with the Tangu Xiangyu Autistic Home in the Tianjin Binhai New Area is a prime example. From 2012-14, ConocoPhillips employees assisted parents of autistic children, specialized teachers, and volunteers in promoting understanding of autism, and providing autistic children with individualized education programs. ConocoPhillips China made a number of donations to the organization, and our employees paid regular visits to the school and spent time with the children.