Posted by Gregg Gethard

Christophe de Margerie, the opinionated CEO of Total. (image: oubangui.wordpress.com)

Cristophe de Margerie, the CEO of French oil giant Total, is not one to bite his tongue—in September he said that oil should be priced below $60 a barrel. In an interview with the European Energy Review published on Wednesday, de Margerie weighed in on the future of hydrocarbon, peak oil, and working with oil-producing nations.

While many of the world’s politicians and pundits are calling for a drastic reduction in the amount of carbon the world produces, de Margerie says that there will always be a need for oil and gas. And while Total has expanded its portfolio and invested in nuclear, clean coal and biomass projects, it has completely steered clear from developing and wind and solar farms.

As he said:

Hydrocarbon production will remain essential in supplying humanity’s energy needs for a long time. The fact is that the world needs increasing amounts of energy. Thus when I hear people who are against hydrocarbon production and against nuclear too, I can only say, you are against the future.

Where many experts claim that we are running out of oil, de Margerie says that’s not true. Instead, he says, we’re running out of the capacity to produce oil. There are plenty of areas with untapped oil reserves—Venezuela, Canada, Brazil, the Gulf of Guinea, and even the Middle East come to mind. He estimated that, within a few years, the world will need to produce over 100 million barrels a day to meet its energy needs; right now, about 84 million are generated. But unless there are investments in the aforementioned places, these reserves won’t be tapped in time to meet the growing demand, and, in his words, “without energy, there will be no growth.”

De Margerie also said that western oil companies and foreign oil producing nations will always be joined at the hip, and the spirit of cooperation between the two must grow. For instance, de Margerie said that Total would be interested in working with Iran if the time was right. He also spoke at length about Total’s involvement in developing natural gas and oil fields in Russia. In the past, Russia has courted Western investors to the projects, only to force these firms out once they near completion. He said that, on a new project Total is embarking on, the French company is working with Gazprom, Russia’s biggest and most important energy firm in order to protect itself, and other companies should not expect to do business without taking similar precautions:

Russia is Russia. It is not New York. It is not even Paris. How surprising! Russia is a producing country. They want to benefit from the oil and gas they have. Why did we think it would be different? Are we naïve or arrogant or just stupid?

While many will disagree with his statements, it’s certainly refreshing to see someone in de Margerie’s position speak so frankly. In this era of carefully managed public relations, he’s not afraid to be politically incorrect.

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