TotalEnergies: skirmishes before a high-voltage general meeting

Europe 1 with AFP // Photo credit: Geoffroy Van der Hasselt / AFP 09:47, May 26, 2023

Scuffles between police and climate protesters broke out Friday morning, with the use of tear gas, near the Parisian hall where the Annual General Meeting of TotalEnergies is to be held. After BP and Shell, it is the French hydrocarbon giant TotalEnergies that is preparing to live an electric assembly, targeted by a coalition of associations that threatens to block it, but also by some of its shareholders who disagree with its climate policy.

"The AGM must be held," was repeated Friday morning on the side of TotalEnergies, while the first shareholders arrived in dribs and drabs. "We will not let them go," said Marie Cohuet, spokesperson for the Alternatiba association, for whom the company "embodies the worst of what is done in terms of exploitation of populations and the planet". At dawn, dozens of climate protesters tried to enter the stretch of street passing in front of the Salle Pleyel in the beautiful Parisian neighborhoods.

Prohibition to use his mobile phone

A dozen of them, who had sat in front of the entrance, were dislodged by the police who, after three warnings in less than a minute by loudspeaker, projected tear gas in the middle of the group. Protesters nevertheless remained near the Salle Pleyel, about a hundred on each side of the stretch of the street blocked by roadblocks of police and gendarmerie trucks. This meeting comes at the end of a stormy AGM season, during which actions have multiplied against the big groups against a backdrop of staggering profits: together, the majors BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron and TotalEnergies post more than $ 40 billion in profits this quarter, after a grandiose 2022.

In a sign of the expected tensions, TotalEnergies has banned shareholders and journalists from using their mobile phones, forcing them to leave some personal belongings at the entrance. Above all, the group wants to avoid the chaotic scenario of last year when NGO activists prevented shareholders from entering the AGM. The authorities expect the presence of 200 to 400 people who "absolutely want to prevent the holding of the GA", according to a police source.

"Total's AGM will not take place," warned 350.org, Alternatiba, Friends of the Earth, ANV-COP21, Attac, Greenpeace, Scientists in Rebellion and XR warned at the end of April. "This general assembly plans to perpetuate the strategy of the oil company: more fossil projects and an unfair distribution of superprofits that fuels climate and social injustice," they denounced.

Towards an increase in the CEO's salary

Among the hot topics, the approximately 1.5 million individual shareholders, present or online, are called to vote on a consultative resolution from the activist shareholder organization Follow This, which mainly tackles indirect CO2 emissions. In other words, those related to the use of oil by its customers in cars or for heating ("scope 3" in carbon accounting), i.e. 85% of its carbon footprint. The shareholders' coalition is asking it to align its emissions reduction targets with the 2015 Paris Agreement, in order to limit global warming to +1.5°C compared to the pre-industrial era.

Among these 17 investors, who own nearly 1.5% of TotalEnergies, are La Banque PostaleAM, Edmond de Rothschild AM, La Financière de l'Échiquier. The group recommends voting against, judging the resolution "contrary to the interests" of TotalEnergies, "its shareholders and its customers". The major will nevertheless highlight its efforts for the climate and calls on its shareholders to "vote in favor" of its own climate resolution.

This official strategy focuses mainly on its direct emissions, from its operations and those related to the energy it consumes (so-called "scope 1 and 2" perimeters). Even if the group does not plan to drastically reduce its direct emissions in the decade, it intends to devote a third of its investments to low-carbon energies and reach 100 GW of renewable electricity capacity by 2030.

Its CEO Patrick Pouyanné, in an interview with La Croix on Wednesday, rejects the criticism, and explains that it must respond to the growing demand of developing countries. "No, TotalEnergies alone cannot reduce oil demand," he said, calling instead for a focus on "the end of coal". The group is present in many liquefied natural gas and oil projects in the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Papua and Uganda, with the controversial Eacop heated pipeline project becoming a media symbol of the anti-oil struggle.

This controversy adds to many others for TotalEnergies, criticized for its record profit of $ 20.5 billion (19.12 billion euros) in 2022, its taxes in France or the salary of the CEO. A 10% increase in his remuneration for 2023 is also on the agenda of the AGM.