Chevron Corporation (NYSE:CVX) and Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE:XOM) shareholders moved en masse to block proposals for the oil giants to ramp up climate targets at their respective annual meetings on Wednesday.
Over 90% of Chevron’s stakeholders voted against the company setting a medium-term goal to reduce indirect emissions, while just 11% of Exxon Mobil’s patrons backed similar targets.
Proposals had been made by Dutch investor Follow This to bring Exxon’s climate targets in line with the 2015 Paris Agreement, which set out aims to limit global warming to 1.5C by 2050.
Chevron, meanwhile, saw proposals tabled to reduce customers’ emissions and create a board committee to evaluate the company’s decarbonisation strategy.
"There is no single oil major that really wants to transition," Follow This founder Mark van Baal commented, “they all want to hang on to fossil fuels as long as possible".
Exxon, which is the only firm of the five western oil major’s not to have a 2030 climate target, saw shareholders reject all 12 proposals at the meeting.
Peers BP PLC (LSE:BP.), Shell PLC (LSE:SHEL, NYSE:SHEL) and TotalEnergies SE (NYSE:TOT, EPA:TTE) have all faced pressure to cut emissions in recent weeks, with activists having to be removed from the former two’s annual meetings.
Climate-minded investors enjoyed slightly more positive results from the three European firm’s meetings, including 30% backing a Follow This motion at TotalEnergies, 20% voting against Shell’s transition plan and 17% urging BP to reduce fossil fuel output faster.
However, with the results ultimately reaching the same conclusion as those on Wednesday, van Baal added: “It’s incomprehensible that most investors still accept […] refusals to cut emissions”.