Woodside shareholders back merger with BHP

20 May, 2022

Shareholders were less supportive however of the company’s climate plan.

Woodside Petroleum’s shareholders voted 98.66% in favour of a merger with BHP’s petroleum arm at the company’s AGM.

The merger would make the resulting company one of the world’s top ten independent oil and gas producers with a value of $40 billion.

The merger, first announced in August last year, is an attempt for both companies to better navigate the energy transition. It is expected to facilitate BHP’s efforts to advance its move away from fossil fuels.

Meanwhile, the merger is set to double Woodside’s oil and gas production and bolster its funding to further expand.

At the AGM Woodside CEO, Meg O’Neill, told shareholders: “The merger is an opportunity for Woodside to increase its contribution to the world’s growing energy needs and build the scale, resilience and diversity to thrive through the energy transition.”

The merger’s completion is scheduled for 1 June 2022.

In her speech, O’Neill also highlighted Woodside’s ESG approach, which primarily focuses on reducing the company’s net equity Scope 1 and 2 gas emissions by 15% by 2025 and 30% by 2030.

However, almost half (49%) of Woodside’s shareholders voted against the company’s climate plan due to disappointment it didn’t set targets to reduce customers’ emissions, also known as Scope 3 emissions.

Several institutions had shown concern over Woodside’s climate ambitions, including proxy advisory firm, Glass Lewis, who recommended shareholders vote against the action in a report.

Glass Lewis believed the climate plan lacked substance and lagged behind other companies’ efforts in the sector to tackle Scope 3 emissions.

Similarly, the Australian Centre for Corporate Responsibility (ACCR) recommended shareholders vote against the plan.

The Centre’s director of climate & environment, Dan Gocher, said of the plan: “Woodside’s newly announced Scope 3 emissions plan amounts to little more than window dressing in the hope that investors won’t notice.”

He argued Woodside’s targets were not aligned with the Paris Agreement and the Australian petroleum producer’s over-reliance on carbon offsets for its 2030 target was “nothing short of laughable”.