Big oil says up to governments at climate talks to rein in demand

LONDON, Oct 29 (Reuters) - Leaders of Europe's biggest oil
and gas companies said political leaders attending U.N. climate
talks that start this week must make carbon markets more
effective and that only governments can effectively curb fossil
fuel demand.

Oil majors will be among the big companies conspicuous by
their absence at the COP26 meeting that begins in Glasgow,
Scotland, on Sunday to attempt to agree ways to limit the
planet's warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit)
above pre-industrial levels.

Ben van Beurden, the chief executive of the world's biggest
fuel retailer Royal Dutch Shell, told reporters this
week that, as oil and gas companies, "we were told that we were
not welcome" at COP26.

European oil majors have set much more ambitious emissions
cutting targets than their U.S. rivals, but they also have to
fend off accusations that, over decades, they hid the role that
their products played in heating the planet.

They have long supported carbon pricing as a
business-friendly way to engineer a transition to a cleaner
economy, but agreement on the role of carbon markets has proved
a major sticking point at climate talks.

"This carbon credits market is currently unorganised,
unregulated and therefore dangerous," TotalEnergies
Chief Patrick Pouyanne said this week, but he reiterated his
support in principle.

"Our positions are well known, we are in favour of carbon
pricing," he said.

Shell's van Beurden in a LinkedIn post on Friday, echoing
previous comments by BP Chief Executive Bernard Looney,
said oil companies alone could not control demand for fossil
fuels.

"Let’s say Shell switched the products we sell overnight.
Instead of petrol and diesel, motorists at our service stations
could only get hydrogen, or recharge their electric cars. It
wouldn’t make people buy a hydrogen or battery electric car.
They would simply drive down the road and fill up at one of our
competitors," van Beurden said.

"So governments will have to play an essential role in
helping to shape demand, using mandates where needed, creating
the right climate for investment, and helping steer society
towards low-carbon and renewable energy."
(Reporting by Shadia Nasralla in London; additional reporting
by Benjamin Mallet in Paris; editing by Barbara Lewis)