NLPC presented a shareholder proposal today at ConocoPhillips‘ annual meeting of shareholders that asked the company to drop its climate targets. NLPC argued that the company’s climate targets push the company to reduce hydrocarbon production or invest in fruitless carbon capture and storage projects. Both paths are a waste of shareholder resources and provide no benefit to the company beyond greenwashing its reputation to please left-wing activists.
The company’s board of directors opposed our proposal, as explained on pages 123-125 of its proxy statement. NLPC’s response to the board’s opposition statement was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission last month.
Presenting the proposal at the meeting was Luke Perlot, associate director of NLPC’s Corporate Integrity Project. A transcript of his three-minute remarks follows:
Good morning. I urge my fellow shareholders to support Item 5, which asks ConocoPhillips to remove every greenhouse‑gas reduction target it has imposed on itself.
These targets may sound harmless, but for an upstream company whose sole competitive edge is producing affordable oil and natural gas, they create an impossible dilemma. Either ConocoPhillips curtails production – which sacrifices revenue, reserves, and market share – or pours billions into carbon‑capture schemes that exist only because of political subsidies that could soon vanish under the Trump administration. Both paths squander capital and weaken the very engine that funds dividends and future drilling.
Management might talk a big game on climate change, but its actions tell a different story. Just months ago, the Company closed a $22.5 billion acquisition of Marathon Oil, a deal that expands Conoco’s shale footprint and locks in decades of hydrocarbon output. You don’t spend that kind of money if you truly believe the world is sprinting to net‑zero.
Meanwhile, the “climate crisis” narrative used to justify these targets rests on the most alarmist projections of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change—projections that many scientists now concede are wildly improbable. Global temperatures have always fluctuated, and today’s emissions from the United States represent barely one‑tenth of the world total. Even if ConocoPhillips somehow hit net‑zero tomorrow, the effect on climate would round to zero, while the damage to shareholders would be unmistakable.
Our competitors abroad are drilling harder than ever. If we hamstring ourselves with self‑inflicted quotas, investors will watch production shift to state‑owned firms in Russia, Saudi Arabia, and China – entities with no regard for environmental stewardship.
ConocoPhillips should do what it does best: find, develop, and sell the energy that powers modern civilization—not chase politically driven metrics that deliver no measurable benefit to the planet and every conceivable cost to owners. A vote FOR Item 5 restores strategic discipline, protects our expansion strategy, and reaffirms that this Company exists to create value, not theatrical virtue signals.
I urge my fellow shareholders to join me in voting FOR Item 5. Thank you.
Read NLPC’s shareholder proposal for the ConocoPhillips annual meeting here.
Listen to Luke Perlot’s presentation of the proposal at the meeting here.
Read NLPC’s response, filed with the SEC, to the company’s opposition to our shareholder proposal, here.
