Not long ago, it was tempting to wait for an epiphany in the mind of an oil company CEO to accelerate the energy transition to renewables.
Our work with Follow This, a campaign of responsible shareholders in oil and gas companies, has ended that illusion. No industry leader, rising to the top job after a successful career drilling for hydrocarbons, can imagine the future beyond oil and gas.
That responsibility lies with investors.
But climate politics is becoming more crowded, as shareholders must pick from a choice of statements and resolutions at oil company AGMs. Please read our hopes for the New Year here (free article), just published by Responsible Investor.
Summary
- CA100+ alternatives to specific climate targets in the Follow This resolution have unintended consequences.
- Shell, BP and Equinor have found abundant room to hide behind worthy joint statements and a worthy resolution as fig leaves for inaction.
- The approach of CA100+ pursues consensus at the cost of reduced transparency and lost urgency.
We, shareholders, will have to answer to our children and grandchildren for what we did — or failed to do. We, shareholders, are the best prospect to compel management to make bold, specific, necessary choices.
In 2020 and the new decade, we urge CA100+ to harness its unprecedented financial firepower to compel oil majors to take leadership in the energy transition.
