French motorists scramble for fuel as strike cuts supply

Frustrated motorists faced another day of long waits at petrol pumps across France on Friday as a strike at energy giant TotalEnergies entered its 12th day.

TotalEnergies, among the world’s biggest oil companies, runs a network of around 3,500 filling stations in France, nearly a third of the total, with most of them low on fuel.

“Does anyone know of a petrol station around here that’s been re-supplied?” read a post in a local Facebook group Friday morning. “Where can I get ethanol?” posted another motorist in the hope of filling the tank before the weekend.

Several of TotalEnergies’ oil refineries have been blockaded by striking workers.

“We’ve been dry since Sunday,” a manager at a station in central Paris said on Thursday.

Since the start of September, TotalEnergies has cut petrol prices by 20 euro cents ($0.19) per litre to help vehicle owners cope with sharp rises in energy prices triggered by the war in Ukraine.

The average price for E5-type unleaded petrol is now 1.62 euros per litre, or 6.19 euros per gallon, up around four percent from only a week ago.

“Everybody wants to buy from us because we’re cheaper,” the station manager said.

Bottlenecks due to strong demand have been exacerbated by strike action over pay, which has cut the frequency of fuel deliveries in half, he said.

Anthony, a plumber in Paris, said traffic was blocked up Friday along an entire boulevard as early as 7:00 am when he started his morning rounds, as people tried to reach a TotalEnergies station in the 12th Arrondissement in the east of the capital.

– ‘Shareholders get a lot’ –

“It’s been like this since 5 o’clock this morning, and every morning before,” said the manager at an Agip station in Marseille, Ali Mansoibou, pointing at a long queue of cars waiting to be served.

Mansoibou said he allowed each driver to buy no more than 30 euros’ worth of fuel, but even so, “there’ll be nothing left for the weekend”.

The government has responded to the shortages by releasing fuel from strategic stocks, Energy Transition Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher told the broadcaster BFM television late Thursday.

In addition, more supplies were being brought in from neighbouring Belgium and elsewhere, she said.

The supply situation would improve “within two or three days”, she predicted, saying that just 15 percent of all petrol stations in France had been affected.

But Thierry Defresne, head of the European works council at TotalEnergies, told AFP that “every site” at the company had announced their intention to extend the strike action.

“Shareholders get a lot, but workers are completely forgotten,” Defresne told RMC radio on Friday.

“Fabulous profits are being made, but they don’t want to offset the impact of inflation,” he said.

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TotalEnergies paid out a special dividend to shareholders totalling 2.6 billion euros ($2.55 billion) after the company — like most in the sector — made exceptionally large profits from high energy retail prices.

The government appeared sympathetic to the wage demands on Friday, with Olivia Gregoire, minister for small and midsize companies, calling on energy majors to “listen to demands for salary rises”.

Most of the sector’s companies had posted “strong results”, she said. “We expect an effort in favour of workers.”

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne called on management and workers at TotalEnergies to exercise “responsibility” in their negotiations and not “penalise the French people”.

Staff at the French branch of oil major ExxonMobil have also demanded higher wages, with angry demonstrators setting fire to wooden crates during a protest in northern France on Wednesday. 

Transport Minister Clement Beaune said fuel trucks would, exceptionally, be allowed to make deliveries on Sunday.

“We’re doing what we can to resolve this situation over the coming days,” he said.

TotalEnergies did not give any details about the impact of the strike on its supply situation, with a spokesperson telling AFP simply that the situation was “stable”.