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A document from the program “Complément d’études” reveals that the companies Total and Elf were aware of the impact of their activities on global warming as early as the 1970s.
The magazine “Further investigation”, a new issue of which will be released on Thursday, October 21, was able to consult dozens of confidential documents from the archives of the world’s largest oil companies. We learn that in 1986, the environment department of Elf foresees global warming. “The accumulation of CO2 and CH4 [le méthane] in the atmosphere and the resulting greenhouse effect will inevitably change our environment. All models are unanimous in predicting warming“, is it in particular written.
Bernard Tramier, environmental director at Elf from 1983 to 2000, describes the company’s reaction and acknowledges that it knew. To reduce greenhouse gas emissions, states impose taxes on these oil activities. From 1985, Elf wanted to defend itself against these taxes, seen as financial sanctions. “With this money, we prefer to reduce our own emissions rather than give it to an organization that will do some we don’t know what.At the time of writing, Elf was a public company.