TotalEnergies SE is going through “unfair” accusations of greenwashing and “radical positions amplified by social networks,” Chief Government Officer Patrick Pouyanné stated in an interview revealed Sunday.
The French vitality group will make investments €5 billion ($5.5 billion) in renewable and low-carbon energies in 2023, making it the oil main “most concerned on this strategic problem,” Le Journal du Dimanche quoted him as saying.
Activists sought to dam the corporate’s Might annual shareholder assembly, the place 17 institutional buyers filed a decision urgent the group to vote for extra formidable emissions targets.
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“Let’s not overlook that demand for hydrocarbons continues to develop worldwide,” Pouyanné stated when requested concerning the group’s technique of getting oil and gasoline nonetheless account for 80% of income by 2030. TotalEnergies plans additionally embody establishing EV-only service stations in Paris and different French cities, he stated.
Pouyanné, 59, stated he’s prepared to increase his time period as CEO subsequent yr if the board needs him to remain and shareholders approve subsequent yr. He took the publish in 2014 after Christophe De Margerie died in a airplane crash.
Uganda Undertaking
Pouyanné stated TotalEnergies misjudged the controversy round a Ugandan oil challenge that French banks have declined to finance, which has left the sphere largely to “Center Jap and Chinese language banks.” “I don’t suppose we realized that this challenge would develop into a logo of the anti-oil combat,” he stated.
Ugandan activists and Western environmental teams argue that the challenge, which entails drilling tons of of oil wells in and round nature reserves, will destroy ecosystems and improve emissions when the world needs to be shifting away from fossil fuels.
“We have been gradual to react and underestimated its affect,” Pouyanné stated.
