Mulva, James J. 1946–

International Directory of Business Biographies, (2005) by Dawn Laney

Following the 1989 Exxon Valdez incident, in which approximately 11 million gallons of oil were spilled out of a damaged oil tanker off the coast of Alaska, worldwide public attention was focused on petroleum companies and their environmental records. Although Mulva's time as CEO did not begin until five years after the spill, the Valdez 's legacy and legislation were a constant concern that shaped the operations of the petroleum company. As Phillips's CEO, Mulva focused on the environmental impact of petroleum operations. He was determined to learn how to increase Phillips's holdings of oil through exploration and production without damaging the environment. Given the ability of most of Phillips's products to cause environmental destruction if spilled, Mulva directed frequent safety inspections of production operations, trained employees in safe practices, and instituted more safety measures to ensure that an incident like the Valdez accident would not occur.

CAREFUL ACQUISITIONS AND MERGERS LEAD TO PROFIT

As CEO of Phillips, Mulva created a five-year strategic plan that used several mergers and acquisitions to make the company more competitive and increase oil exploration and production. Through increasing oil exploration and production, Phillips hoped to avoid being taken over by the huge companies resulting from the mergers of medium-sized businesses, such as Exxon and Mobil and Chevron and Texaco.

In February 2000 Phillips joined its chemical and plastic operations with Chevron to create the Chevron Phillips Chemical Company. For Phillips, the plastics and chemical portion of the company began to decline in strategic importance as an asset as Phillips focused on a new strategic plan for the oil-and-gas sector of the business and a series of explosions at Phillips plants in 1999 and 2000 created public image problems. Through the spin-off and joint venture, Mulva helped create a global chemical production company with an excellent financial position, more assets, and enhanced growth prospects.

In April 2000 Mulva led Phillips in the acquisition of the Alaskan oil-and-gas production assets of the Atlantic Richfield Company in an attempt to boost its upstream exploration and production. The Alaskan assets were sold to satisfy the terms of a legal settlement that resulted from the large BP Amoco/Arco merger. The assets augmented Phillips's holdings in a nonvolatile location and increased the company's barrels of oil equivalence to 2.2 billion reserve barrels of oil and 340 thousand new barrels per day of production.