Patrick Pouyanné never pretends. When he’s not happy, it shows. In this year 2016, the imposing boss of Total is grumpy. The tanker is struggling with justice to keep a permit to explore a shale gas deposit in the Drôme. The courts challenge him, because it is forbidden in France to practice hydraulic fracturing, widely used to extract these gases buried in the rock. Pouyanné does not understand. He would like us to at least know if there is indeed exploitable shale gas under our feet. “And if there are, then we can discuss what we will do,” suggests the boss of Total.
But now, while the war in Ukraine is inflaming gas prices, while a Russian gas embargo is under consideration, gas…
