Chevron chief executive Mike Wirth argues the company is 'selling a product that has changed the quality of life on this planet. For the better.' Photograph: Jeenah Moon/BloombergTo Chevron’s critics, who range from Just Stop Oil protesters to the governor of its home state and the president of the United States, the $300 billion US oil and gas major exemplifies an industry recklessly promoting products it knows are warming the globe while greedily pushing up petrol prices.
The prospect of winning over big oil’s antagonists looks remote, and the bodyguard travelling with Wirth is a reminder that the opposition he faces is not just rhetorical. Energy security, energy affordability and lower emissions were “in tension with one another”, Wirth admitted. But he said he was working on the basis that Chevron’s core products will be in demand for decades to come.
Wirth was born in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where his father worked in the National Laboratory, a federally funded research and development centre, before moving the family to Golden, Colorado, to become an executive at Coors. In one summer job at the brewer, Wirth found himself making ashtrays, and realised what loyalty his father inspired by talking to people on the production line.
Wirth now leans on the advice of three former Chevron chief executives, who all live within five miles of his house. “These guys have lived through the fall of the Soviet Union, multiple recessions and wars and embargoes and terrorist attacks,” he noted. Over regular lunches, he grills them on the lessons they learned from such crises.
Since then, Wirth’s cost controls and surging oil prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have turned Chevron into a cash-generating machine, with returns on capital employed more than double what they were in 2018. After almost $70 billion in dividends and buy-backs since he became CEO, its shares have outshone big European rivals.
Chevron’s decision to prioritise profits and continued oil production over decarbonisation has made it a target for progressive politicians, climate litigants and campaigners.
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