THE CARBON WAR

Chapter 9
Doom, boom, or bust
London, 12 th June 2014
A conference organised by the Financial Times and the International Finance
Corporation in a Mayfair hotel. A panel with Shell, GE, and Macquarie Bank.
The Shell man, Wim Thomas, is chief energy advisor. The GE man, Ganesh
Bell, is Chief Digital Officer. The Macquarie man, Simon Wilde, is a Senior
Managing Director. The dire but typical gender balance is partially repaired by
chair Pilita Clark, the FT’s environment correspondent and leader of the paper’s
energy team. We have an interesting title to guide our discussion: “Energy:
doom, boom, or bust.”
Wim Thomas had his marching orders set on May 16 th , in the form of
a letter sent to all shareholders. “To whom it may concern,” it reads, “we are
writing this letter in response to enquiries from shareholders regarding the
‘carbon bubble’ or ‘stranded assets’ issue.” It goes on to argue that there is nothing
for an investor to worry about in these concepts. “The world will continue to
need oil and gas for many decades to come, supporting both demand, and oil
& gas prices. As such, we do not believe that any of our proven reserves will
become ‘stranded’.”
The whole concept is “fundamentally flawed”, Shell concludes. And worse,
“there is a danger that some interest groups use it to trivialize the important
societal issue of rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.”
Carbon Tracker is not named, but it is clear who they must be targeting
with this comment.
I have been accused of many things by the incumbency over the years.
Trivialising global warming is a first.
The notion of stranded assets is flawed because of “a failure to acknowledge
the significant projected growth in energy demand, the role of carbon capture
and storage (CCS), natural gas, bioenergy and energy efficiency measures.