Being a world-class player in the energy transition

Energy is at the heart of one of the most daunting challenges of the 21st century: preserving our planet endangered by climate change. Our role as a broad-energy company is therefore to continue to operate in accordance with the Paris Agreement, with a view to achieving, together with society as a whole, carbon neutrality in all our global activities by 2050.

ENERGY IS LIFE

Energy is fundamental to life. Whether for cooking, heat, lighting or traveling, humans need energy, humans need energy: it is central to our activities and a source of progress.

Energy is also at the heart of the major global challenges set out in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. It is essential for providing access to education and healthcare for the greatest number of people, reducing hunger and poverty, helping to empower women, promoting peace, building sustainable cities and stimulating the economic forces that generate jobs and income.

As a broad-energy company, our role is therefore to provide people around the world with the energy they need to support their socio-economic development in a sustainable world and ensure their well-being.

Our answer: To produce and supply energy that is ever more affordable, cleaner, more reliable and accessible to the greatest number of people in order to contribute to the sustainable development of the planet.

ENSURING OUR ACTION IS IN LINE WITH THE PARIS AGREEMENT

Climate change is a reality.  There is an urgent need for climate action. In addition, the Paris Agreement, which emerged from the COP 21 held in France in 2015, has catalyzed awareness of the climate issue.

Energy is at the heart of the climate change challenge, as its production and use generate nearly 70% of greenhouse gas emissions. The climate stakes therefore require that everyone commits to achieving a carbon-neutral society by 2050. Undertaking the energy transition is indeed a collective exercise: governments, investors, companies and consumers all have an important role to play.

To achieve this, we have set ourselves ambitious goals for 2030, both for our direct emissions – i.e., those generated by our operating facilities and corresponding to “Scopes” 1 + 2 – and for our indirect emissions, i.e., those resulting from the use of our products by our customers (Scope 3).

Our answer: Actively reduce our emissions to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 across our global operations, together with society as a whole.

TRANSFORMING SUSTAINABLY

Energies are our business. To make our broad-energy company a world-class player in the energy transition and achieve, together with society as a whole, carbon neutrality by 2050, we must act on two fronts: avoid and reduce our emissions while offering a less carbon-intensive energy mix.

We are integrating this shift towards less carbon-intensive energy into our strategy, among other things by investing massively in solar and wind power, with the aim of joining the world’s top five producers of renewables by 2030. We are also promoting natural gas, hydrogen and biogas to decarbonize transport, not to mention our investments in biofuels. Finally, in a volatile hydrocarbon market, our strategy is to invest selectively and at competitive production costs with one goal: to prioritize the quality of our investments over the quantity of projects.

However, decarbonizing the energy mix will not be enough to eliminate all emissions. That is why we also need to capture residual carbon through carbon sinks, whether they are “natural”, such as forests, regenerative agriculture or wetlands, or via carbon capture and storage (CCS) facilities.

Sustainable transformation also means involving our customers in our ambition to become carbon neutral in order to collectively reduce our emissions. In other words, it is a matter of offering them products and energy solutions that are less and less carbon intensive. Our advantage? The lasting relationship of trust that we have built with our customers, by being ever closer to their needs and expectations.