TotalEnergies SE may have to pay more than a billion euros ($1 billion) under a proposed European Union levy on windfall profits of oil and gas companies, chief executive officer Patrick Pouyanne said.
The European effort will “exceed 1 billion euros,” Pouyanne said at a hearing in Parliament in Paris on Wednesday.
The EU has proposed that member states introduce a temporary levy on companies in oil, gas, coal and refinery industries as part of the bloc’s plan to help consumers who face soaring energy costs as Russia reduces gas deliveries to Europe.
The CEO urged European governments to adopt similar approaches to that windfall tax to avoid production reallocations among member states. He also said it should be normal to be able to offset part of the windfall tax with losses incurred at the peak of the Covid pandemic.
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