It feels like a set-up for an extremely late capitalism joke: If you bring an oil CEO to a climate conference…
But that’s exactly what happened on Thursday, October 14, at TED Countdown in Edinburgh, Scotland. Youth climate organizers brought the punchline: They interrupted Royal Dutch Shell CEO Ben van Beurden during a panel discussion.
TED Countdown comes a few short weeks before the United Nations’ annual global climate conference, a.k.a. COP26, which will also be hosted in Scotland. TED Countdown describes itself as “a global initiative to champion and accelerate solutions to the climate crisis, turning ideas into action,” pushing for an ultimate goal of halving global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. To youth climate activists, those goals seem to be in direct conflict with hosting Van Beurden.
Shell is the seventh-largest producer of greenhouse gases in the world. In May 2021, in landmark litigation, a Dutch court ordered Shell to speed up its plans for reducing emissions 45% by 2050, and move that deadline up to 2030. Van Beurden, in an age-appropriate move, took to LinkedIn to complain that Shell was “singled out” and that reducing one company’s emissions wouldn’t make a difference in fighting climate change. (Climate scientists likely would beg to differ.) Despite claiming it wants to fight the climate crisis, Shell is appealing the ruling. “We agree urgent action is needed and we will accelerate our transition to net zero. But we will appeal because a court judgment against a single company is not effective,” Van Beurden said in a statement about the appeal.
At the conference, organizers with U.K.-based youth climate group Green New Deal Rising and Stop Cambo — a campaign to stop the development of the Cambo oil field off the coast of Scotland, which will be operated by Shell and Siccar Point Energy — took matters into their own hands. Lauren MacDonald, an activist with both groups who shared the stage with Van Beurden, was expected to ask a question of Van Beurden that was cowritten with TED organizers, according to Earther. Instead, she took the opportunity to tackle Shell head-on.
“No matter what he says today, remember, Shell has spent millions covering up the warnings from climate scientists, bribing politicians, and even paying soldiers to kill Nigerian activists fighting against them, all whilst rebranding to make it look at though they care, and that they have the intention of changing,” MacDonald said, looking directly at Van Beurden. “Disproportionately, in the Global South, so many people are already dying due to issues related to the climate crisis such as pollution, extreme heat, and weather-related disasters. This is not an abstract issue, and you are directly responsible for those deaths.” Youth organizers later came in front of the stage with a white banner reading, “No future in fossil fuels.”
“Fossil fuel companies of any kind should not be welcomed at events that claim to focus on climate justice. It is disrespectful to frontline activists — many of whom were not invited to this event and are unable to attend COP26 due to vaccine apartheid — as their communities are directly harmed by the decisions of these CEOs,” a statement from protest organizers reads. “Van Beurden’s inclusion as a speaker suggests that these companies are part of the solution, but they are not. They should be held accountable for their crimes against humanity and be dismantled, replaced by a just transition that centers frontline communities, workers, and the voices of those who are most affected by climate breakdown.”
Want more from Teen Vogue? Check this out: We Can’t Keep Giving Polluters a Say on How to Address the Climate Crisis
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