California & Ecuador's Amazon
Ecuador's Amazon has been drilled for oil for over sixty years. California has been one of its largest customers the entire time. The human and environmental cost — still unpaid, still spreading.
Sixty Years of Extraction
Where California's Ecuadorian oil comes from
Ecuador supplied 11.94% of California's foreign crude in 2025 — all of it from the Amazon rainforest. Unlike Brazil's offshore pre-salt fields, Ecuador's oil comes almost entirely from onshore wells drilled directly into the Amazon jungle in the provinces of Sucumbíos, Orellana, and Napo.
The crude exported to California is primarily the Oriente and Napo blends — heavy Amazon grades refined in California from fields that have been producing since the early 1970s. In 2024, Ecuador was California's second-largest foreign crude source at 16.9% (51.97 million barrels). The connection between California's fuel and the Ecuadorian Amazon is not economic and distant. It is direct and physical.
More than 60% of the Ecuadorian Amazon is currently under oil concession, with approximately 28,000 square miles of oil blocks in active operation.
What sixty years of drilling has done
No oil-producing country has inflicted more damage on its Amazon per square kilometer than Ecuador. The legacy begins at Lago Agrio — where operations from 1964 to 1990 left behind what indigenous communities and environmental scientists have called the "Amazon Chernobyl."
Over 16 billion gallons of toxic wastewater were deliberately dumped into jungle soil and streams — a shortcut that saved roughly $3 per barrel. More than 900 open waste pits were dug into the forest floor and abandoned. Oil spills from pipeline ruptures have repeatedly reached the Napo River, Coca River, and their tributaries — waterways that communities depend on for drinking water, bathing, and food.
Across the Amazon, Ecuador has lost 650,000 hectares of primary rainforest since 1990 — approximately 110 American football fields per day, every day, for over two decades. Oil infrastructure — roads, wells, pipelines — is the primary mechanism by which the frontier advances.
The Yasuni Referendum — A Verdict Ignored
In August 2023, nearly 60% of Ecuadorians voted in a historic referendum to permanently ban oil drilling in Yasuní National Park — one of the most biodiverse places on Earth, home to uncontacted indigenous peoples. A year later, the wells were still running. The government has been slow to comply, and production continued as legal battles over the shutdown timeline dragged on.
California's Ecuador Import (2024)
51.97M bbl
16.9% of California's foreign crude. Ecuador was the #2 foreign source in 2024. All from Amazon onshore fields.
Source: California Energy Commission, 2024
Toxic Wastewater Deliberately Dumped
16B gallons
Into Amazon soil and waterways, 1964–1990. Plus 17 million gallons of crude oil spilled from pipelines. 900+ open waste pits abandoned.
Source: Amazon Defense Coalition; ChevronToxico.com
Forest Lost Since 1990
650,000 ha
Primary Amazon rainforest lost in Ecuador through 2016. Equivalent to 110 American football fields cleared every single day for 26 years.
Source: Amazon Frontlines; Ecuador submission to UNFCCC
Unlike Brazil's offshore pre-salt fields, Ecuador's crude is extracted directly from Amazon jungle. Every barrel refined in California from Ecuador came from the forest. Sources: CEC; Amazon Watch; Amazon Frontlines.