One of the Rossport Five is to receive the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize in recognition of the group's Corrib pipeline campaign, writes Lorna Siggins.
Willie and Mary Corduff had almost no air miles to their credit earlier this week when they left the sun-baked bog in Erris, north Mayo, to fly halfway across the world.
"To be honest, we've taken a plane once before in our lives, and that was two years ago to England, and I'd rather be at home out on the bog and with the horses and cattle," Corduff told The Irish Times.
The quiet 53-year-old farmer and father of six - who came to national prominence almost two years ago when jailed for 94 days over his opposition to the Corrib gas pipeline as one of the "Rossport Five" - was getting around to packing his bags, while pinching himself at becoming Ireland's first winner of the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize.
The fact that he represents Europe, and will be presented with a cheque for $125,000 (€92,000) in San Francisco's opera house on Monday, and that he and Mary will then be feted at a plethora of functions next week in Washington attended by top US and international political movers and shakers, wasn't reflected in his demeanour and voice.
"I'm a back page rather than a front page man, and we are part of a community," Corduff was keen to emphasise.
"There are a lot more people involved in this than us. I'm only doing it because I hope it will help our cause. As for the money, I've always said - and I said it to three groups of lawyers helping us fight our case against Shell, some of whom tried to persuade us to settle for compensation - that it is not about that. Money has ruined people, and you're never going to be left over the ground when you die. Even if you're penniless, someone will bury you. So this will be going to someone or some group who will help us with our case."
Dubbed the "Nobel prize for the environment", the award was established by a San Francisco-based insurance broker Richard N Goldman and his late wife, Rhoda, in 1990 to "recognise ordinary individuals working at the grassroots level who protect and enhance our environment".
The couple shared a passion for arts and culture, Jewish affairs and the environment, and their philanthropic foundation has given nearly half a billion US dollars to a variety of non-profit organisations that have endeavoured to "make the world a better and safer place".
Eight previous winners (among more than 100 worldwide) have been appointed to or elected to national office in their respective countries - becoming environmental ministers in some instances.
The 1991 winner for Africa, Wangari Maathai, won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize, and the late Nigerian writer, Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was executed with compatriots over his opposition to Shell's activities in Ogoniland in the Niger delta, received it in 1995.
Under the award's rules, the prize must go to six individuals, so Corduff was selected over his colleagues who were also jailed - Philip and Vincent McGrath, Brendan Philbin and Micheal Ó Seighín - along with five other winners.
Up on the platform with him will be Icelandic businessman Orri Vigfusson (64) who is known in Ireland for his campaign to ban commercial driftnetting for salmon. As the award's office notes, it is ironic that two of this year's six have challenged the Irish Government's environmental record in various ways.
Vigfusson was nominated in the "islands and island nations" category, while African winner is Hammerskjoeld Simwinga (45) of Zambia, who has created a sustainable community development programme in the North Luangwa valley, where illegal poaching has decimated the wild elephant population and left the villagers in poverty.
North American winner is Sophia Rabliauskas (47) of Canada, who has secured interim protection for a portion of forest in Manitoba which has been under threat from logging and hydro-power development.
South and Central American winner is Julio Cusurichi Palacios (36) of Peru, who has worked for a national reserve to protect sensitive rainforest ecosystems.
Asia's winner is Ts Munkhbayar (40) of Mongolia who has encouraged government and grassroots organisations to ban mining on Mongolian waterways.
Many of the recipients, current and previous, have taken great personal risks: indeed, Willie Corduff was never in a court until the Shell injunction took him there in 2005. A recent survey for the Goldman Trust indicates that the award winners' work has benefited an estimated 102 million people worldwide.
Orri Vigfusson, whose family background is in herring, quips about his "green capitalism". He made his money in vodka, and it was his passion for sports angling that led to his interest in the future of the wild Atlantic salmon.
He has spent many years brokering compensation agreements with governments and commercial interests, and estimates that open-sea fishing for salmon has fallen by over 75 per cent in the Atlantic as a result.
His most recent success, and that of his North Atlantic Salmon Fund (NASF) was in Ireland, where a driftnet ban came into force last January. However, he believes that the Government's €35 million compensation package is too small.
"Netsmen are nice people, they have their livelihoods to think of, and respecting them is very important," he says, in a warning to the politicians. He intends to use his $125,000 cheque for his NASF work.
Vigfusson is familiar with the Corduff's story, which has been well documented, and told in their own words in the recently published book, Our Story: the Rossport 5 .
In the book, the couple describe the hardship of making a farm out of the bog, surviving a major fire which took almost everything they had when their children were small, and how they learned the real meaning of community support.
With the help of their neighbours, they survived on the dole, cutting turf and seaweed and living off their own potatoes and milk. The book tells of their first information on the gas project, relayed through the parish priest, while the bishop was flown out to the rig in a helicopter by then lead developers, Enterprise Energy Ireland.
That use of church and politicians to win support did not impress them, but they only became directly involved, and concerned, when the developers began entering their lands to plan for the onshore high-pressure gas pipeline, linking a planned refinery at Bellanaboy, a mile from their farm, to the gas field 65 km out to sea.
As the pipeline was exempt from planning, the landowners were issued with compulsory acquisition orders signed by former marine minister Frank Fahey before the 2002 general election.
The gas refinery was subject to planning, but was initially rejected as being on the "wrong site" by Bord Pleanála inspector Kevin Moore in a ruling published in April 2003.
The refinery was subsequently approved on foot of a revised application. Following the men's jailings on June 29th, 2005, a review was commissioned by Minister for the Marine Noel Dempsey over health and safety concerns relating to the pipeline, and an attempt at mediation by former Ictu secretary general Peter Cassells.
Last year, the developers agreed to modify the pipeline route, and they are now seeking final consents at an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) oral hearing. Corduff believes the refinery must be built offshore, and the Government must review its terms for oil and gas exploration companies working in Irish waters.
"If we value our natural resources, we can pay our nurses who do a terrific job, we can have a better health service, more schools. The gardaí won't be used in the way they are being used as Shell's security in north Mayo.
"I'm honoured to get this prize, but the worst may yet be to come for us, as we have been so marginalised. The best prize for me will be to hear that Shell is going to sea."