Shell plans to close 1,000 gas stations globally, focus on EV charging

Fuel giant Shell plans to close 1,000 gas stations across 2024 and 2025, while scaling up its network of public EV charging stations, according to its latest Energy Transition Strategy 2024 report. That's a global initiative, with no indication of how many — or even if any — of those dinosaur-juice station closures will be in Canada or the U.S., but the bulk of its new charging stations appear to be planned for China and Europe, at least initially.

Shell had earlier reported setting a target of becoming a net-zero-emissions energy company by 2050. In the report, the company said it aims to “grow our public charging network for electric vehicles, and remain one of the world's largest blenders and distributors of biofuels.”

It also said that as it progresses, “we expect to sell more low-carbon products and solutions, and (fewer) oil products, including (gasoline) and diesel.” The goal is to “reduce customer emissions from the use of our oil products” by 15 to 20 per cent by 2030, as compared with 2021.

The company plans to get rid of 500 stations in 2024, and another 500 in 2025. That sounds like a lot, although it's a minor drop in the gas tank, since the company owns about 40,000 stations globally, along with another 10,000 operated in conjunction with partner companies.

Also on a global basis, Shell operates more than 55,000 public charge points under its Shell Recharge banner — although that number doesn't refer to stations filled with chargers, but rather, counts each charger individually. The company said it plans to increase that to 70,000 by 2025; and to up to 200,000 by 2030.

Shell Recharge has public chargers in Canada, with most of them in British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario, and at last count, two in Saskatchewan, and one each in Manitoba and P.E.I. Globally, its largest station is in Shenzhen, China, about 2.5 kilometres from the airport there, containing 258 fast-charging points.

In the report, Shell said there are currently around 1.3 billion cars on the road worldwide, and they drink up 25 million barrels of oil per day, “which is a quarter of the world's oil production.” The company expects “rapid growth in electric vehicles, including plug-in hybrids,” with about 40 million on the road today, and a forecast of 275 million by 2030.

Shell said it is focusing on public charging, rather than home charging, “because we believe it will be needed most by our customers.” It added that it has a “major competitive advantage” by already having one of the world's largest networks of service stations, and that its convenience stores can offer food and other items while drivers are waiting for their vehicles to charge.

Shell is also a major supplier of lubricants, and it plans to grow that business by offering transformer oil for offshore wind parks, and cooling fluids for EV batteries.