TotalEnergies Uganda Oil Project 'Devastating': Conservationist

Total Energies' $10-billion Tilenga project involves drilling more than 400 oil wells in western Uganda, many of them in Murchison Falls Nature Park, a biodiversity reserve and the country's largest national park (Credit: AFP)

Production has yet to begin, but TotalEnergies' controversial East African oil project is already taking a dire environmental toll in Uganda's largest national parks, a leading conservationist group said Friday.

Despite opposition from environmentalists and rights activists, the French energy giant is pushing ahead with its Tilenga drilling project in Uganda and a 1,443-kilometre (897-mile) East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) to transport its output to the Tanzanian coast.