Hi everyone, great to have you here on this week's episode of Outrage and Optimism. Today

we have something really very fascinating for you and I think you'll agree it goes

right to the heart of whether humanity will be able to transition to a net zero world

fast enough to deal with the climate crisis. Ben van Birden has been at Royal Dutch

Shell for 38 years and he took up the responsibility of Group CEO in January 2014. Over the last

eight years he had responsibility for steering one of the world's oil supermajors into

a future that is more and more concerned about the damage that fossil fuels cause.

Now Shell states that it is fully committed to a world with no more than 1.5 degrees of

warming. Earlier this year Ben launched Shell's climate strategy with a commitment to be net

zero by 2050, including not only the company's own operations but also all the fuel that

Shell sells. Their plan is to achieve this with reductions with fuel switching, with growth

in hydrogen and renewables and also through investments in nature-based solutions to offset

residual emissions. The plan of course met with very mixed reactions with some hailing

it as a breakthrough that an oil and gas company should make such a commitment and they

are one of only a few that have and others declaring it an act of greenwash and claiming

this shows all that's wrong with long term net zero targets because it kicks the can

down the road and allows even fossil fuel providers to claim that they are part of the solution.

The issue however got even more interesting just last month when the district court in

the Hague delivered its ruling in the climate change case filed against Shell by friends

of the earth Netherlands. In her ruling, Judge Larissa Olwin ordered Shell to reduce its

greenhouse gas emissions 45% by 2030 from 2019 levels. Shell itself had planned a 20% cut

by 2030. The court also found that Shell's existing carbon mitigation strategy was

...