Demonstrators block access to the room where the General Assembly of TotalEnergies is to be held, on May 25, 2022 in Paris (AFP/Bertrand GUAY)
Started under high tension with shareholders blocked outside by demonstrators, the general meeting of TotalEnergies ended in the middle of the day on Wednesday with a large vote in favor of the climate strategy of the French gas and oil giant, denounced by environmental NGOs and several small shareholders.
Nearly two hours before the start of the GA, about 200 activists overtook the security guards present. They installed themselves, even chained in front of the doors of the Salle Pleyel in Paris to prevent access to shareholders and thus hoped to block the holding of the annual meeting.
Others have deployed a large banner “stop fossil fuel projects”, in Angola, Tanzania or Mozambique where the group is established. Activists are particularly concerned about Uganda’s controversial oil mega-project, EACOP, with an “early 2025” horizon.
During the General Meeting, TotalEnergies made a commitment through the voice of its CEO Patrick Pouyanné to carry out a series of actions in favor of the environment in this country, by financing rangers to fight against poaching or by planning to restore thousands of hectares of forests.
“We may want to denounce evil, but we must also look at what we can bring,” he said to climate activists.
At the opening of the meeting, which had to be held “in camera” and online, Mr. Pouyanné apologized to the shareholders who could not access the room. Less than fifty of them, who arrived early, were able to attend.
“The meeting can take place normally, he said then, more than 28,000 shareholders are present, represented or voted by mail, which represents a quorum of 68.87% of shareholders”.
D (AFP/Bertrand GUAY)
The GM ended around 1:00 p.m. with a vote on a resolution on the group’s climate strategy, adopted by nearly 89%, however down compared to 2021. “The shareholders support the strategy implemented at a very large majority”, welcomed Mr. Pouyanné.
For the NGO Reclaim Finance, this result demonstrates on the contrary “the failure of shareholder engagement which is lost in endless and fruitless dialogues”. In a press release, it calls on “climate-conscious investors to act now to halt their investments in gas and oil expansion”.
Demonstrators block access to the room where the General Assembly of TotalEnergies is to be held, on May 25, 2022 in Paris (AFP/Bertrand GUAY)
The activists present in front of the Salle Pleyel booed the result, once known, before singing “Total, Total, we must choose fossil fuels or our future”, observed an AFP journalist.
“Today, we lost a battle but in a year we can win the war, minds are changing,” MEP Pierre Larrouturou, present on the spot, told AFP.
– An internal and external dispute –
The demonstrators, surrounded by around twenty police officers, remained outside the room for the duration of the GA, then were able to leave the premises, in small groups and in peace, once the session was over.
They consider the oil and gas group “totally irresponsible” because it continues to exploit oil and gas, despite calls from scientists to drastically reduce the use of fossil fuels to fight against global warming.
Police dislodge demonstrators who block access to the General Meeting of Shareholders of TotalEnergies, May 25, 2022 in Paris (AFP/Bertrand GUAY)
They also denounce the presence of the group in Russia. The former Total, renamed last year, “finances Putin’s war machine,” Svetlana, an activist with Stand with Ukraine, told an AFP journalist.
“Total continues to operate with an economic model that is that of the world of yesterday,” said Jean-François Julliard, director general of Greenpeace France, also present on the spot.
In the room, at least eight small shareholders hoped to influence the group’s climate orientation, a movement observed in multiple large companies in France, the United States and elsewhere.
Among the rebel shareholders, Edmond de Rothschild or La Financière de l’Echiquier, not particularly known for their shareholder activism, as well as the Dutch MN. But also Meeschaert Amilton, Mandarine management and Sycomore AM, or Assurances du Crédit Mutuel. All had announced that they would vote against the climate plan submitted to the shareholders.
In question: the anticipation by TotalEnergies of a “sharp increase in the production of hydrocarbons over 2019-2030” but also the regret that “the surpluses resulting from the current high prices of hydrocarbons are not allocated as a priority to additional investments in the renewable”, according to Assurances du Crédit Mutuel.
Especially since the group made a profit of 16 billion dollars last year.
-New green acquisition-
TotalEnergies says it is aiming for carbon neutrality by the middle of the century, and is committed, among other objectives, to reducing by more than 30% compared to 2015, the emissions released by the petroleum products it sells.
D (AFP/Bertrand GUAY)
It invests in renewables, adding a major US producer, Clearway, to its portfolio on Wednesday.
But the group estimates that demand will remain strong, not believing in a 30% drop by 2030, as envisaged by the International Energy Agency (IEA). The “fall in demand for oil and gas will not be linear,” Pouyanné told the handful of shareholders present in the room.
els-mt-im-nk-cla/jbo/nth
© 2022 AFP
Did you like this article ? Share it with your friends with the buttons below.
