Por its 100th anniversary, TotalEnergies will present its results and strategy on Friday May 24 at the general meeting of shareholders. In view of the strategic choices, the major is doing everything to celebrate its 150th anniversary, in 2074, in a planet which will have become largely uninhabitable.
Because TotalEnergies does not intend to reduce its contribution to the ongoing climate catastrophe; on the contrary, it plans to accelerate it by increasing its production of fossil fuels. During his hearing by the current senatorial commission of inquiry, its CEO, Patrick Pouyanné, defended his investment plan, which plans to increase its production of fossil fuels by 2% to 3% per year over the five coming years.
Instead of ceasing all investment in new fossil fuel infrastructure, as recommended by the International Energy Agency in order to hope to meet the objective of the Paris agreement, TotalEnergies has decided to do the opposite.
Denigrating scientists
To justify its investments, TotalEnergies’ tactics are now well established and structured around six points.
1. Green the brand’s image inexpensively: change its name and systematically highlight renewable energies in its public communication, even though these only represent 2% of the group’s production in 2023, and that they will remain below 10% in 2030.
2. Distort scientific facts to make its development policy falsely compatible with climate objectives, which authors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had already denounced in February 2023.
3. Denigrate scientists if necessary. “I respect the opinion of scientists, but there is real life”, retorted Patrick Pouyanné to climatologist Jean Jouzel in September 2023, forgetting in passing that it is “real life” that climatologists and ecologists are talking about: heat waves, melting glaciers, drop in agricultural yield, record ocean temperatures, disappearance of species, famines. The ecological disaster is already causing and will continue to cause millions of victims, destroying “real lives”.
4. Justify your strategy with the hackneyed and often dismantled argument of a ” request “ which would of course have to be answered. Let us remember that the dependence of our societies on fossil fuels, far from meeting a need, was built and remains maintained by companies in the sector. TotalEnergies, for example, continues to build gas-fired power plants that will contribute to this “demand” for decades to come.
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