Almost everyone seems to agree: it is necessary to drastically reduce the consumption of fossil fuels to limit global warming. But is it up to the companies and producing countries to turn off the tap? Or should we let the market run and wait for demand to decline, while continuing to feed the beast?
Before the parliamentary elections on Monday, September 13, these issues dominated the campaign in Norway, where the oil and gas sector alone accounts for 14% of gross domestic product, 20% of exports and 160,000 jobs. But the results of the poll do not matter: weaning is not for tomorrow.
Illustration in Stavanger, the oil capital, on the west coast, birthplace of Equinor, born Statoil in 1972 and 67% controlled by the Norwegian state. On June 15, Anders Opedal, CEO of the oil giant, presented the group’s new strategy, focused on the diversification and decarbonisation of production. “It’s a balance. We are continuing to do what we are doing, reducing the carbon impact, in order to free up enough capital to finance the energy transition ”, summarizes the Frenchman Philippe Mathieu, director of strategy.
Priority to wind power
On the one hand, the Norwegian giant plans to devote 50% of its investments to renewable energies and low carbon solutions by 2030. On the other hand, Equinor wants to reduce CO intensity by 40%2 of its production by 2035, to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. Currently, 5% of the company’s investments are devoted to new energies. We will therefore have to give a serious boost: “This will be done gradually, and we will rely on our skills in the offshore oil industry. », Explains Mr. Mathieu.
Priority is given to wind power, with a net capacity of 12 to 16 gigawatts by 2030, of which two thirds in offshore. Equinor has already invested in several large projects, notably in the United Kingdom and the United States. The Norwegian also plans to tackle floating wind power, as part of the Océole partnership in France, announced in July, with Renewable Energy Systems and the consulting firm Green Giraffe.
Equinor relies on carbon dioxide capture and storage to offer a new service to its industrial customers wishing to get rid of their emissions
Another coveted sector: “blue” hydrogen, produced from natural gas. “We have the gas, the infrastructures, the customers and the relations with the industrialists, in Europe and in the United Kingdom”, specifies Philippe Mathieu. As for CO emissions2 resulting from the manufacture of hydrogen, Equinor plans to imprison them underground.
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