MADRID (Reuters) – After nearly a century, Spain’s second-largest oil company Cepsa is changing its name to Moeve to reflect its shift towards low-carbon businesses, Chief Executive Maarten Wetselaar told employees on Wednesday.
Owned by Abu Dhabi fund Mubadala and U.S.-based private equity firm the Carlyle Group, Cepsa is investing up to 8 billion euros ($8.65 billion) to shift to low carbon energy and sustainable mobility, focusing on green hydrogen, biofuels and electric mobility.
“I’m thrilled to announce that a great brand, Cepsa, which has been with us for over 90 years, is transforming, and to tell the world that we’re becoming a different type of organisation,
Moeve, in which the majority of profits will come from sustainable activities by the end of this decade,” the CEO said.
Under its strategy, the company has sold upstream assets in Abu Dhabi and South America, divesting nearly 70% of its oil production assets compared to 2022.
At the same time, it has launched projects such as a 2 gigawatt green hydrogen facility and what it says will be Southern Europe’s largest biofuels plant in the southern Spanish region of Andalusia.
Founded in 1929 as Compania Espanola de Petroleos SA, the group currently has some 11,000 employees.
The new brand will be rolled out progressively across its network of more than 1,800 service stations in Spain and Portugal, the company said.
($1 = 0.9244 euros)
(Reporting by Pietro Lombardi; Editing by Sharon Singleton)
