Environmental Engineering Reference
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company strategy, leading to a fast deployment
of significant resources in diversification: “BP
alternative energy business manages a series of
dynamic, fast-growing activities, including solar,
wind and hugely promising technology of carbon
capture and storage. All those activities carry the
potential to help the world make the transition
to a lower-carbon economy- a transition that
is essential if the risks of climate change are to
be avoided and is a sustained transition that BP
started 10 years ago” 12 . BP committed to important
investments to pursue a wide range of opportuni-
ties, organised in numerous decentralised units,
led by influential Business Unit leaders. The BP
case shows an example of an oil company aim-
ing to redefine itself as an energy company in a
broader sense.
The position of Total seems rather more con-
servative in its approach. The CEO, Christophe
De Margerie acknowledges the emergency of
climate change issues, but remains confident in
the predominance of fossil energy sources in the
mid term and sceptical as regards the concept of a
global “decarbonisation” of the economy 13 : “Hu-
manity cannot escape the following contradiction:
it will takes many years for low-carbon energies
sources to overpass fossil fuels. To acknowledge
this does not mean being irresponsible, it is being
realistic to undertake actions” 14 . The company
finds necessary to diversify its activity but en-
visage these investments as a realistic answer to
the evolving context (enhanced energy security
issues and environmental concerns), leading to
the adoption of measured approaches.
chose to develop a large set of technology options
including solar, wind, hydrogen and gas-fired
power plant in the 2000s. All these activities were
grouped in “BP alternative energies” in 2005. The
diversification process of BP started with some
mature technologies (such as wind, some solar
technologies and gas-fired power plants), but the
company also decided to get actively involved
in the development of longer-term options, with
R&D on CCS and hydrogen.
However, in 2005 and 2006, the company
faced a huge reputation risk with the conjunction
of several events: an accident on a production
platform in the Gulf of Mexico, a considerable
oil spill in Alaska, and an explosion in Texas City
refinery. All these factors combined induced the
necessity for the company to review the nature
of its activities. It ended up with the decision to
re-centre activities on the core-business and as
a consequence, the company reduced consider-
ably the renewable energy portfolio. A large part
of the alternative energy branch is focusing on
biofuels. The CEO Tony Hayward declared in
June 2007: “Beyond Petroleum…was not, and
is not a denial of our core business…[it is] about
three things - producing more fossil fuels more
efficiently today, making better use of fossil fuels
and beginning the transition”.
Total selected alternative technologies syner-
gising the most with its core-business. The op-
tions undertaken were primarily: producing more
energy more efficiently, increasing efficiency of
petroleum products, developing biofuels and the
Carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology.
A secondary priority was to acquire capital in
renewable energies (wind, biomass and solar).
The company is more aggressive to earn a position
in the nuclear sector (as shown by the attempt to
get involved in a project in Abou Dhabi with a
consortium gathering EDF, AREVA, GDFSuez,
Vinci and Alstom). There is no specific unit dedi-
cated to renewable energies, as they are grouped
within a broader sub-unit “new energies”, includ-
The Reliance to the Core-
Business as a Pullback Force
BP technological choices and innovation strate-
gies started with a strong diversification in solar
in 1997. The company also set target on emissions
from its operation in 1998 (-10% under 1990
emission level to be reached in 2010), initiated
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