Shell CEO Ben van Beurden
How to debate the transition with oil and gas firms
Is anger and a refusal to allow any comeback a useful tactic to shake up cosy complacency? Or is reasoned debate more useful?
An October Ted event where a climate activist, blinking back tears, launched a tirade at a slightly bemused Ben van Beurden, CEO of Shell, before refusing to let him answer her question and then storming off the platform she had agreed to share with him has captured global headlines. And maybe that is a good thing. It is unlikely that the conversation would have reached as wide an audience without the impassioned intervention of Lauren Macdonald, a member of both youth climate group Green New Deal Rising and Stop Cambo, a campaign to halt the development of a West of Shetland oilfield. On the flip side, it is hugely unlikely that her remarks would have gained any traction had they not been d
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