A longtime contractor with the British multinational Shell has publicly denounced the oil and gas company’s climate plans, accusing it of “double talking” by saying it wants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while working to take advantage of new fossil fuel sources.
Caroline Dennett, who is based in the UK and says she has consulted with Shell on safety issues for more than a decade, said Monday she was ending her ties with the company and urged others in the fuel industry fossils to do the same.
“I’m leaving because of Shell’s double talk on the weather,” Dennett said in a public post on the LinkedIn business networking site.
“They know that the continued extraction of oil and gas is causing extreme damage to our climate, our environment and people. And whatever they say, Shell just doesn’t run out of fossil fuels.”
Shell, which is due to hold its annual general meeting of shareholders on Tuesday in London, responded by saying it was committed to achieving zero net emissions by 2050.
“We have set short, medium and long-term goals, and we intend to achieve them,” the company said in a statement. “We are already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon energy, even though the world will still need oil and gas for decades to come in sectors that cannot be easily decarbonised.”
Dennett said his growing personal concerns about climate change made it increasingly difficult to work for Shell.
“It’s one thing to support a company to, hopefully, transition to alternative energy sources and make sure they work safely,” he told The Associated Press. “It’s another thing to support new oil and gas projects.”
Dennett said climate change was not a topic of discussion among the company’s front-line staff.
“It’s probably happening in the public relations team and in the marketing and branding team, but it’s not happening in the operating divisions from what I can see.”
“The results will be catastrophic”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres last month accused some government and business leaders of saying one thing but doing another when it comes to tackling global warming.
“In short, they are lying. And the results will be catastrophic,” he said, calling for an end to all new fossil fuel infrastructure.
Guterres recently appointed a panel of experts to examine companies’ net zero claims amid concerns that they could be a simple “green wash.”