John Browne is used to being an opponent of the oil industry. It’s been 25 years since the former BP CEO made the historic speech to his alma mater at Stanford University in which he became the first Big Oil leader to link hydrocarbon emissions and change. climate. He was denounced by many in his office. “I was told that he had left the church for the oil industry; I didn’t realize there was one, “he says dryly.
Lord Browne of Madingley is now back at odds with his former colleagues and agrees with Rishi Sunak’s extraordinary tax on North Sea oil and gas operators to help fund a £ 15bn package for households. The management of the public debate by the current head of BP, Bernard Looney, has been so clumsy that the tax is called “Looney tax”.
“It’s right and right: these unexpected ones belong to the nation, not the companies,” Browne says. “I’ve been charged unexpected taxes by many jurisdictions in many places.”
However, the crossover team warns: “The benefits should be taxed, but the costs should be considered carefully because you should be able to cancel your capital as you go along, as well as “And operating a system that allows you to do all this right has always been complex. When you add an extraordinary profit tax, we just have to be careful about how you do it.”
He recalls an extraordinary tax in the early 1980s that caused companies to pay more than 100% in taxes. “It took an eternity for the government to organize it and they didn’t trust anyone to tell them what the price of oil was, so they set the tax higher than it was. So there are issues like this: you have to think about “But I think it’s okay to help people with their bills.”
Its timely conversion to the cause of climate change has been received with some skepticism. It included a failed BP brand change as “Beyond Petroleum” which some labeled as greenwashing. The man the financial press dubbed the “Sun King” spent 41 years at BP, the last 12 as executive director until 2007. His buccaneer business consolidated the place of the oil giant in the world game, including its controversial expansion into Russia, while receiving millions in salaries and bonuses each year. These days he is busy with his latest company, the green investor BeyondNetZero.
CV
Age 74 Family “Successfully developing a new partnership.” Education The King’s School, Ely; Master of Physics from St John’s College, Cambridge; and a master’s degree in business from Stanford University, California. Pay “I’m pretty self-sufficient today.” Last vacation, Venice, “my favorite place on earth” (where he has a second home). The best advice they’ve ever given me is that once my father told me to “get a proper home.” “The biggest mistake of the race is not being gay before. My first book was called Beyond Business, and the climate growth company I co-founded and now chairs is called BeyondNetZero.” How to relax “Ballet, theater, opera and art. And exciting people and interesting places”.
We meet at Browne’s house in Chelsea just as Sunak is delivering his mini-budget. His personal library is filled from floor to ceiling with volumes on all eras of art. At the top of the spiral staircase hangs a collection of Browne portraits by renowned German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans. There is a mottled Browne, reflected in a mirror, and Browne standing next to a cutting board, in front of him a half-cut crispbread (“I can’t even cook,” he laughs). He is a light figure, with a pink shirt and blue blazer, with ridge glasses.
On the pride site is a framed image of Browne’s late mother, with a bright red handbag. He played a disproportionate role in his corporate career: Browne claimed it was to protect his mother, an Auschwitz survivor, who had been hiding his homosexuality for decades.
The Mail on Sunday came from the “deep depths of the closet,” which posted a kiss and explanation from her Brazilian lover, Jeff Chevalier, a former escort. The episode led to his resignation from BP. Do you have any regrets? “Tones. I wish I could have gone out earlier. My mother’s advice [was] don’t become a minority … never tell anyone a secret because they will use it against you. “These are important things that a Holocaust survivor tells his son,” he said.
Browne was found to have lied about how he met Chevalier, telling his lawyers that they had known each other by running in Battersea Park instead of online. “It was a lie. Such a bad misjudgment.” What would you say to Chevalier now? “I wish you a good day. I don’t hold grudges.”
Still, Browne says his ignominious departure from BP opened up new opportunities for him. “No one would have offered me a job in a public company, and I didn’t want to ask … there was definitely a favorable coating in that cloud.”
Fifteen years of presidency, government work and council positions followed. His cultural roles have taken place at the Tate, a non-profit theater, the Donmar Warehouse and now at the Courtauld Institute of Art. The pride of his personal collection is a 16th century Titian. He has become an author and has a few thousand words in his latest work, inspired by a series of podcasts linked to the Cop26 climate conference.
BP’s “Beyond Petroleum” brand change drew criticism for the eco-friendly wash. Photo: Neil Hall / EPA
His business positions have included the board of directors of Chinese technology company Huawei, which he left when Britain followed the United States to hamper its operations (“technically what they were doing was fantastic”). Then there was the fracker Cuadrilla. The government has opened a gap from the energy crisis to technology, but Browne says, “We could have generated gas supplies, which would have helped a lot, but maybe it’s too late.”
His main position is now president of BeyondNetZero. He founded the business, which is led by Lance Uggla, who founded research firm IHS Markit last year to invest in companies that help manage and measure emissions, decarbonize assets, improve energy efficiency, and accelerate the circular economy. So far, his interests range from a solar specialist operating in sub-Saharan Africa to a planned vertical farm project for America.
But does that make him a rioter in the oil industry? He laughs as he is dubbed a “tree hug” to defend renewables.
Shell faced protests at its shareholders’ meeting last week, and protesters said it was not investing fast enough in renewable projects. How can oil and gas leaders effectively balance old and new technologies? “People would look for the green wash at any moment: if you said ‘we’re spending a billion dollars,’ they’d say ‘we’re spending two billion.’ Balancing is an ongoing debate.”
Following a political outcry, BP pledged to divest its Russian assets during the Browne era. Should I have brought BP to Russia? “In 2003, Putin paid a state visit to the United Kingdom. We had a banquet with the Queen and Prince Philip. He was considered a reformer who was going to open up Russia and be good for security.” For a decade, Browne often met with Putin and resisted his demands to give the Russians majority ownership of BP’s joint venture with TNK. “It was like a glass wall, very difficult to read. With virtually no likes or dislikes, you might expect a trained spy. “
Most recently, Browne worked with LetterOne, controlled by oligarch Mikhail Fridman, which is now subject to sanctions. Maybe the West should have seen Russia’s deadly advance? “In retrospect it seems obvious, but it’s like going out on the street and asking people, ‘Why didn’t you collect your ISA three months ago?’ It was obvious. “
Browne stays connected to BP, having an irregular dinner with Looney (they take turns paying). He is eager not to become a dominant figure in Sir Alex Ferguson, hiding from the business. He says Looney has done a “very good job of portraying his strategy and is doing it slowly.” Looney was one of Browne’s last “turtles”: anxious acolytes destined for important jobs.
Tony Hayward, a fellow turtle and Browne’s immediate successor, was responsible for the fatal Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. Browne was in a Dallas, Texas hotel that day: “It was a tragedy. I was watching TV … that was really an existential threat to BP. ” Five years earlier, Browne had witnessed the removal of bodies after the Texas City refinery explosion. He has faced accusations that fostered a culture that led to Deepwater Horizon. “Everyone at BP says that’s not true. That was just pure speculation.”
Browne is advancing in its renewable energy mission. He concludes: “We are on the brink of an industrial revolution if you believe, like me, that everything we do should be aimed at reducing emissions to zero. The reason is not so much the result on the planet, but the people. If we let temperatures break down, we will probably experience a lot of migration and deaths due to flooding and heat stress on agricultural yield. It’s about saving at least a basic subsistence for all of humanity. ”
There is no calm sunset in the stormy race of the Sun King.