Copublished with Réseau Action Climat, Les Amis de la Terre France, Notre Affaire à Tous, 350.org & Greenpeace
19 June 2024. The Senate Committee of Enquiry into the resources mobilised and available to the State to ensure that the TotalEnergies Group takes account of and complies with France’s climate obligations and policy guidelines has published its final report.
The associations welcome the harsh and unequivocal diagnosis of TotalEnergies’ climate-wrecking strategy, but regret the lack of ambition of most of the report’s 33 recommendations, particularly in terms of binding measures to force the Group to meet the targets set by the Paris Agreement.
Over the past six months, the experts and scientists interviewed have shown that TotalEnergies’ fossil fuel expansion strategy is accelerating the climate crisis and threatening human rights, pointing the finger at its desire to increase hydrocarbon production and strengthen its liquefied natural gas activities in particular. Others also highlighted the lack of transparency regarding the group’s lobbying of politicians, and the porous links between TotalEnergies’ executives and the state machinery, and the French diplomatic support for its international strategy.
On the other hand, Patrick Pouyanné and the other oil major representatives who appeared before the committee defended the group’s ‘climate’ strategy and current practices whatever the cost, with no apparent desire to change them despite their dramatic impact. Bruno Le Maire’s intervention showed a clear lack of political will to regulate the multinational or commit it to a gradual phase-out of fossil fuels.
For our organizations, this report has the merit of opening the debate within one of the country’s key democratic bodies on the imperative need for the State to regain control of its role as regulator of multinationals, and in particular of the fossil fuel sector. It was not a foregone conclusion that this report would be adopted, given the divisions within the enquiry committee, and it is therefore the result of difficult compromises. The organizations therefore emphasize the importance of certain concrete recommendations, such as a halt to imports of Russian LNG at French and European level, as well as measures affirming the need for greater transparency or more regulation by the State to enable a shift away from fossil fuels. But they deplore the fact that the right-wing Senate majority has sought to reduce the ambition of the report’s recommendations and has chosen to overlook major issues such as the question of taxing the super-profits of the oil and gas majors.
Two opposing views emerged from the hearings and the work of the committee of enquiry. On the one hand, there was the industry and its political backers, who dismiss TotalEnergies’ responsibility for the climate crisis; on the other, those who warn of the increasingly tangible risks that this logic poses for our future and who remind the State of its duty to protect the public interest.
The solution cannot be to pass the buck to the citizens alone, who already pay a high price for energy, by telling them to reduce their consumption. The State must introduce strong political constraints to force the fossil fuel industry to reduce its carbon footprint and pay for the damage already caused. In this period of political instability, this divide is a reminder that it is essential to have a new, determined political majority on this issue.
Edina Ifticène, Fossil fuel campaigner at Greenpeace France
The French government is failing in its obligations by not regulating TotalEnergies’ climate trajectory. In the 1990s, the major’s lobbying and misinformation meant that we collectively lost precious decades in preventing the worsening of climate disruption. Today, we have a clear democratic verdict and solutions on the table to correct this historic error and finally protect future generations..
Justine Ripoll, campaign lead at Notre Affaire à Tous
The Senate Committee of Enquiry into TotalEnergies, the fruit of a long process of campaigning by French civil society, has concluded its work but has left us wanting more. While it recognizes the need for the State to exercise greater vigilance over the company’s activities, it remains far too timid in its recommendations on the regulatory role of the State in imposing a genuine energy transition that is fair and compatible with the climate emergency. While the Commission rightly suggests making fossil fuel companies contribute to the Loss and Damage Fund, it does not go so far as to propose taxing their indecent super profits, which could also help combat the fuel poverty from which one in five French people suffer. This is a missed opportunity to take the government at its word, as France is co-leading an international initiative on taxation to generate revenue for climate and development. It could set an example by attacking the profits of the fossil fuel industry now. It is high time our leaders put an end to this impunity.
Soraya Fettih, campaign lead for France at 350.org
The French government needs to be consistent. It cannot advocate the end of fossil fuels at international summits such as the COPs and, at the same time, turn a blind eye to TotalEnergies’ actions. At COP28, France, like all other countries, made a commitment to move away from fossil fuels. Today, if we hope to remain credible, words must be followed by deeds. We urgently need to force TotalEnergies to comply with the Paris Agreement. Let’s turn off the fossil fuel tap to avoid the costs of losses and damage linked to climate change and adaptation efforts. We have fallen far enough behind and we must act now to ensure a liveable future.
Gaïa Febvre, International policy lead at Climate Action Network France
The many hearings held during this committee of enquiry have highlighted not only the extent of the harmful consequences of Total’s activities, but also the weakness of the State in its desire to regulate this multinational. Solutions do exist, however, and beyond the findings, we regret that the report’s recommendations are not more ambitious, in particular to put an end to economic diplomacy in support of Total and to the company’s unbridled lobbying. Similarly, while the report contains a recommendation to halt hydrocarbon projects in Azerbaijan, the evidence and testimonies on human rights violations linked to the EACOP project in Uganda seem to have left the conservative senators unmoved, blinded by their complacency with the multinational.
Nevertheless, some of the recommendations are more concrete and must now be followed by action: while the committee of enquiry recommends including Russian LNG among the energy products under European sanctions, the State must break its silence and take a stand in favor of the package of sanctions being negotiated in Brussels at this very moment. These sanctions must cover imports and transhipment operations that enable Russia to export more LNG around the world.
Juliette Renaud, co-ordinator at Amis de la Terre France
While the committee emphasized the central role of finance in shaping the energy sector, the senators generally missed the point. Apart from a few welcome recommendations on corporate governance, they confined themselves to formulations that reveal the resignation of politicians in the face of the urgent need to redirect financial flows. For example, they should have followed up on the recent announcements by BNP Paribas and Crédit Agricole, which have pledged to stop supporting conventional bonds for the oil and gas sector, by imposing this measure on all French financial players, instead of simply encouraging them to go further in decarbonizing their portfolios.
Other recommendations are of the same ilk, showing at best timid support for measures under discussion at European and international level, such as the introduction of differentiated rates. Taken as a whole, these measures fall far short of the standards required to avoid a runaway climate and a major economic and financial crisis.
Lucie Pinson, director at Reclaim Finance
