Shell to spend £230million planting trees

ROYAL Dutch Shell will spend £230m planting trees and buying up wild sites such as wetlands over the next three years.

In a bid to burnish its green credentials, the Anglo-Dutch oil giant said the first of many projects it will fund include paying for 2,500 acres of forest in Spain and for 5m trees in the Netherlands.

But as well as planting trees it also plans to buy sites such as forests and wetlands, which it would protect, meaning Shell could also become a major landowner. The money will come out of its £1.5bn a year clean energy budget.

The company announced the investments as it revealed a raft of measures to absorb some of the carbon released into the atmosphere by its own fossil fuel-containing products.

Garry White, chief investment commentator at investment management firm Charles Stanley, said: ‘This should be welcomed. All companies publish “greenwash” propaganda, but actions speak louder than words.’