According to British media reports, Shell CEO Ben van Beurden plans to step down next year after almost a decade at the helm.

The moment is good for the 64-year-old: Europe's largest oil and gas company is awash with money, while consumers are complaining about record prices.

The search for a successor has already begun.

According to a Reuters report, two men and two women are on the shortlist: Canadian Wael Sawan, who heads Shell's integrated natural gas and renewable energy business; Dutchman Huibert Vigeveno, head of Shell's "downstream" business, i.e. oil refining and processing activities Shell, the Australian Zoe Yujnovich, head of the "Upstream" division, the production activities, and the British Sinead Gorman, who acts as CFO.

Philip Pickert

Business correspondent based in London.

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The energy company is currently doing well due to the rapidly rising prices.

Its share price has risen 35 percent since the beginning of the year - slightly more than that of rival BP.

The market value is now £166 billion, higher than it was at the end of 2014 when Beurden took over.

This spring, Shell, with its 82,000 employees, made an adjusted profit of $11.5 billion, its highest quarterly profit in 14 years.

Greater focus on renewable energy

In July, van Beurden said in an interview that the question of a successor was not on the agenda.

But he said that when he retires and looks his grandchildren in the eye, he wants to be able to tell them, "I did this to make the world a better place."

The chemical engineer from the Netherlands worked for Shell for almost four decades.

During his tenure as CEO, the $53 billion takeover of rival BG Group fell in 2016. Shell has also risen to become a major supplier of liquefied natural gas.

In recent years he has endeavored to portray himself as a driving force behind a green transition.

Shell has announced that it will stop exploring for new oil and gas fields by 2025 and aims to become more and more a renewable energy provider.

There is also pressure from outside, such as a Dutch court ruling on reducing CO2 emissions by 45 percent by 2030. Van Beurden said the ruling would not change Shell's CO2 reduction strategy.

The biggest topic at the moment is of course the energy crisis since the Ukraine war.

Shell has to divest its holdings in Russia.

Beurden recently warned that the energy crisis with supply bottlenecks in Europe could last several years.

The solution lies in "energy saving, rationing and the very, very rapid development of alternatives".