BP is going green, but electric vehicle chargers at its service stations are not yet on its list.
The company says there needs to be certainty in energy policy to underpin investment in renewables.
“We’re looking to grow our gas and renewables business and see robust growth in this area out to 2040, and we support policies that support certainty around investment in lower carbon technologies like these,” BP global strategic planning vice-president Dominic Emery told Fairfax Media.
“The world needs more energy and we need to reduce emissions by 50% by 2040. In general, anything that allows more certainty for investment we support.”
BP chief executive Bob Dudley says a carbon emissions solution is needed to drive down energy use.
“Put a price on carbon and you incentivise everyone to use less energy.”
BP recently invested A$200 million in Europe’s largest solar company, Lightsource.
“We want to develop a six-gigawatt solar portfolio,” Emery says.
The company is also one of the largest wind power generators in the US.
BP’s Australian petrol and service stations remain a key focus. However, Emery says BP won’t consider attempting a retail partnership again, like its failed $1.8 billion tie-up with Woolworths.
BP had agreed to buy 543 Woolworths fuel and convenience stores, but the deal was rejected by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
Emery says BP’s slower organic growth includes electric vehicle integration at its service stations, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.
“Electric vehicles are a penetrable market for us, but there are no incentives or subsidies to ramp it up in Australia,” he says.
“I think for electric vehicles we’ll look overseas and learn from what others are doing and that will be applied in Australia.”
Caltex has a similar outlook, seeing electric vehicles as an inevitability for the sector but also with no short-term plans to integrate the technology.
Meanwhile, BP is looking at future oil and gas operations in Western Australia.
