Students, former students and teachers had been opposed for two years to building a building of the oil group on the school campus.
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The oil giant finally gave up. After two years of dispute, several administrative remedies and the opening of a preliminary investigation for illegal interest aimed at its CEO, Totalnergies announced, Friday, January 28, the abandonment of its project to implant a center of Research and development in the Ecole Polytechnique, on the Plateau de Saclay (Essonne).
Instead of building a new building in the immediate vicinity of the prestigious engineering school, the group will settle “this year in premises to accommodate business innovation centers”, also located on The Saclay plateau, but a little further from the x. Ultimately, more than 200 researchers must be part of this pole dedicated to new energies and electricity, which intends to develop collaborations with “Laboratories of universities and schools, businesses and start-ups”.
For the opponents of the project, this abandonment is a “total victory”. Polytechnic students – under military status, they are held on the duty of reserve -, former students but also teachers criticized the idea of installing a building of the oil major at the heart of the campus, between the classrooms and Housing, not outside, as is the case for other school partner companies. They denounced the fact that the initial project, validated in June 2018, provides that the building be a place for students, in addition to a research center.
an open investigation against Patrick Pouyanné.
“We had two main claims and they were reached, reminds Matthew Lequesne, the spokesman of the Sphinx association, which brings together several tens of ex-pupils. That Totalnergies settles on the Saclay Plateau But do not have an exclusive position with its own building in the center of the campus, and that its building is only dedicated to research. “
Since 2019, students and alumni, supported by NGOs, challenged the plans of Totalnergies by organizing gatherings or publishing forums. Three administrative remedies had been filed. In its communiqué, Totalnergies “notes” that the building project is the subject of “appeal that will require several years before it can be permanently purged and allow its construction”.
In parallel, the sphinx, Greenpeace France and anticor complained for illegal taking of interest against the CEO of Total, Patrick Pouyanné, which led to the opening of a preliminary investigation by the National Financial Prosecutorization ( PNF) in May 2021. These associations reproach Mr Pinyanne for taking advantage of his position as a member of the Polytechnic Board of Directors, starting in September 2018, to influence, on behalf of TotalEnergies, the final decision to validate the project of implantation, on June 25, 2020. According to the information of the world, a search aimed at accessing documents relating to Totalnergies and the mailboxes of Executive Executive Managers took place at the Polytechnic School on September 15, 2021, in the framework of the investigation. The minutes of the Board of Directors of the Ecole Polytechnique of September 16, 2021.
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