Board of Regents decision comes after years of student calls to divest the university’s holdings in fossil fuels
After many years of student lobbying, Victoria University announced to The Strand on September 6th that the Board of Regents (BoR) has voted to move forward with selling the Weyburn Oil Well. An email statement to The Strand wrote, “As part of Victoria University’s commitment to ‘intensifying sustainability initiatives across the entire university,’ as articulated in our five-year Strategic Framework, and in alignment with its goal to divest from fossil fuels by 2030, the Board of Regents has approved the sale of a piece of land in Weyburn, Saskatchewan that has an oil well on its property.” Discussions surrounding the Weyburn property increased following an article in The Strand last January.
The statement from Victoria University continued: “The property had been bequeathed to Victoria University in 2003. Planning is currently underway to determine how the proceeds for the sale, which will remain as part of the endowment, may contribute to further sustainability efforts on campus.” The Weyburn Property, with its farm and oil well, was donated by the estate of Mary Moundfield along with $3.9 million in stocks (which is equivalent to around $6.76 million adjusted for inflation). A majority of the donation was directed towards the creation and maintenance of the Vic One program.
According to the Barrel of Oil Equivalent Report, which tracks the oil and gas industry, the oil well owned by Victoria University is located in the so-called “Weyburn Unit,” which is controlled by Whitecap Resources Inc. It is important to note that this Weyburn Unit sits on the historical territory of many Indigenous peoples, such as the Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, the Niitsítpiis-stahkoii ᖹᐟᒧᐧᐨᑯᐧ ᓴᐦᖾᐟ, the Assiniboine, and the Michif Piyii. Whitecap Resources identifies itself as “a Canadian clean energy company;” yet, in 2022 they produced an average of over 144 thousand barrels of oil and natural gas per day (a 25 percent increase from the year before). The Report continued that Vic’s oil well specifically produced around 19 barrels of oil and natural gas per day during the first two months of the year, and that, “income net to Victoria University … was approximately $94,500, or $567,000 on an annualized basis.” It finished by stating that cash offerings for the oil well ended this past June 22. Victoria University has not yet publicly shared the exact nature of any offers they received for the property.
Atlas Changulani, the current VUSAC Sustainability Commissioner, commented in an official statement to The Strand that, “This decision is yet another victory for student advocacy—it’s yet more proof of the power of sustained solidarity and direct action.” They continued that, “Nonetheless, I’m disappointed that the Board has chosen to sell the oil well and not decommission it. It’s clear that the BoR continues to put profit over people and [the] planet. We cannot let this stand. I urge the BoR to take this as a chance to do better. Instead of attempting to greenwash their image, I urge the Vic Administration to put the profits garnered from this sale toward genuine climate action instead of false solutions, and toward affordable student housing and food security.”
They finished by stating, “I also urge students to remember that this fight is not yet over. This is undeniably another student win, but we must keep up the pressure and continue to demand better: for ourselves, our communities, and our collective futures.”
The BoR has not publicly stated to whom they will be selling the land and the oil well, nor the specific initiatives to which they will direct the revenue from the sale. Many students are still calling for the oil well to be shut down rather than sold off to continue operations, as activists await further details about Victoria University’s divestment plans.
