How do you manage to please investors while investing in electricity, which is less profitable than fossil fuels, and managing climate pressure?
It's simple. If I want to invest heavily, 4 to 5 billion a year in low-carbon energies, and I'm consuming cash somewhere in these investments, well, I need to create it. And what do I create? By producing more oil and gas.
Artificial intelligence is causing electricity demand to explode. On the other hand, electric vehicles in Europe are perhaps being adopted a bit slower than expected, and conflicts in the Middle East are reshuffling the cards on gas and oil. How do you see the energy mix in 10 years?
Why are electric vehicles advancing more slowly? Because they're expensive. I mean, quite simply. In France, you have to know that the vast majority of French people don't buy new vehicles, they buy used vehicles. There are no used electric vehicles. And so, they're waiting for them to exist.
You spent your vacation in Indonesia, in Indonesia, there are queues at gas stations. Because people are rationed, they have a center of 2 liters per day. They can't take more. There was a project that was, however, unpopular, it's the ICOP project, so this pipeline in Uganda and Tanzania which was qualified by Amnesty International as a high-risk project for human rights and the environment, there were thousands of people who were displaced. How do you respond to the criticisms on this project?
Have you looked at the project a little bit?
I see that it's a pipeline of several thousand kilometers.
The truth is that we weren't attacked because of the displacement of populations. That's the argument that was used because human rights immediately make you sensitive. The real issue the NGOs had on this subject is that it's an oil pipeline. In fact, on this planet, as soon as someone wants to build an oil pipeline, a fossil fuel pipeline, they are attacked because it's an infrastructure, and so they say we don't need to do this in 2025 when we want to fight climate change. That's more like it.
Friends, today we have the chance to interview Patrick Pouyanné, the CEO of TotalEnergies. It's one of the world's largest energy companies and one of the largest French stock market capitalizations. So, I only have half an hour with him, but I'm going to ask him the questions everyone is asking. How do you become the CEO of a major global group? How does he manage the current energy crisis in the Middle East and how does he see the global energy mix evolving in 5 to 10 years? But also questions that spark heated debates, the need for gas and oil projects, the share of investments dedicated to renewables, or the company's carbon trajectory. Let's go.
How are you?
Thank you very much for accepting this interview. I imagine it's a pretty busy day for you.
No, it's fine, I was born for you.
Very happy. To try to show ourselves up to the task.
Well, you already are, you're taller than me.
No, no, apparently you're taller.
I saw, it's 1.94. I'm just 1.89.
No, it's missing 2 cm. So, what do you do in life?
Me, for 7 years, I worked at Goldman Sachs in equity derivatives.
Ah yes, you're a bit far from there.
I've changed a bit. For 4 years, I've been an entrepreneur and content creator.
And why did you leave Goldman Sachs?
Not very inspired by the people around me, to be honest.
They thought too much about money.
Yeah, that's it. They didn't have too many other ambitions than that.
It's going. You made a fortune at Goldman Sachs, you can be an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurship is going well.
It's going. Good, very well. So, let's go.
So, Mr. Pouyanné, you've been leading TotalEnergies since 2014. It's the 4th largest oil company in the world. We can say it's a dream job. How does one become the CEO of a major international group?
I don't know if it's a dream job. For me, yes, it's a dream job, but maybe not for everyone. How do you become one? Well, you become one by working. It's quite simple in life. And then, you work and you demonstrate that you have a certain number of qualities. You also have flaws, but the qualities must be more important than the flaws. In fact, I joined this company in 1997 after a first career outside in the administration, and then I gradually demonstrated that I had the capacity. It wasn't me who asked for it, you know. You don't become CEO because you ask for it, but because a number of people have judged you fit to take over from Christophe de Margerie. That's how you become one, but fundamentally by working, and since it's an exciting job, by making the company's future your own. That is to say, in this kind of job, you embody the company, and the company becomes almost everything in our life.
So in March 2026, you did something quite bold. Your traders bought the equivalent of 70 ships of oil storage, anticipating the energy crisis. Can you give us a bit of the behind-the-scenes of this decision?
Yes, well, that wasn't me. In our case, it was really our trading team. The trading teams simply observed that there was a US Navy aircraft carrier not far from the Gulf, or even in the Gulf. And so they thought it was possible that there would be an American intervention. Some small rumors. Well, they took a position. They thought that if there was an intervention, well, suddenly, having ships in the Gulf could have value, provided we could get them out. And so they took this position. It's a logistical position, actually. It's not trading, it's not the casino, trading is not. Today, by the way, in the context of the crisis in the Middle East, what has value are the teams that are able to identify ships, tankers, oil tankers that will enter and exit the Strait of Hormuz, because today there aren't that many ready to do it. So that's the job. And so they took this position, well, they had ships, they filled them, and they managed to get them out because if they hadn't gotten them out, we would have been a bit stuck. So there, by the way, we have about ten that were stuck for a long time, but the essential part was out. So, in fact, it's never... but that's what trading is, it's anticipating movements that could happen. Others could have done it, we did it. That's a bit of it. Well, afterwards, they don't always win, sometimes they anticipate it wrong, it happens. This time it went well. For example, our gas trading teams in June thought that the price of European gas would rise because natural gas from Qatar, which is a major supplier, 20% of the global market, was blocked, and well, the price of European gas... so the positions they had taken were losing ones. So there's a bit of everything in there.
