THE NEW YORK TIMES
Shell says a court ruling on greenhouse gases will speed up its plans to cut emissions.
: June 9, 2021
Royal Dutch Shell will respond to a recent defeat in a Dutch court by accelerating its efforts to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions, the company’s leader said Wednesday.
Ben van Beurden, the chief executive of Shell, said that he was “disappointed” by the ruling requiring the oil company, Europe’s largest, to move faster in slashing greenhouse gases, but added that the company was planning to do just that.
“For Shell, this ruling does not mean a change but rather an acceleration of our strategy,” Mr. van Beurden said in an article published on LinkedIn. “We will seek ways to reduce emissions even further in a way that remains purposeful and profitable,” he added.
On May 26, the District Court in The Hague ruled that Shell must reduce its global net carbon emissions by 45 percent, by 2030 compared with 2019. The court said that Shell owed a duty of care to the citizens of the Netherlands, where the company has its headquarters, to protect them from the consequences of global warming like rising sea levels.
The Shell executives may have realized that the ruling is a harbinger of increased pressures to come and that Shell, which has a long history dating to the 19th century, needs to do more on climate change if it wants to thrive in future decades.