‘Deep concern’: Shell employees urge CEO to rethink shift from renewables in rare letter

Shell employees have written a letter addressed to the CEO stating they are “deeply concerned” by the direction the fossil fuel giant is heading in. Namely, away from renewables.

The open letter, written by two employees in the company’s low-carbon division, was posted on Shell’s internal web earlier this month and seen by news agency Reuters this week.

It comes after Shell boss Wael Sawan announced plans to scale back investments in renewable energy at the firm’s investor day in June.

Co-authors Lisette de Heiden and Wouter Drinkwaard took issue with this in their letter, which received 80,000 views, 1,000 likes and many heated comments, according to company sources.

“For a long time, it has been Shell's ambition to be a leader in the energy transition. It is the reason we work here," said the letter, addressed to Sawan and Shell’s executive committee.

“The recent announcements at and after the capital markets day [CMD] deeply concern us,” it continued. “We can only hope the optics of the CMD announcements are deceiving us and that Shell continues its path as a leader in the energy transition.”

Readers may be surprised to hear Shell described in these terms.

Only 1.5 per cent of its overall expenditure is spent on solar and wind power generation, according to an investigation by NGO Global Witness earlier this year.

The oil and gas company had said in 2021 that it would gradually cut oil production each year for the rest of the decade. But Sawan backtracked on this at the 2023 investor meeting.

Shell also split up its low-carbon and renewables division and scrapped the role of global head of renewables.

And in recent months it has exited offshore wind projects in Ireland and France, and said it was seeking to sell stakes in