Shell Celebrates 40 Years of Scenarios

The Hague, The Netherlands (ots/PRNewswire) -

Scenario planning helps Shell make critical business decisions

Forty years ago, in 1972, work began on what many people regard
as the first Shell Scenarios document, published the following year,
though the roots of this work lie even further in the past. Since
then, scenario planning has been at the heart of Shell's business,
developing senior leadership understanding of critical factors in the
business environment and the possible directions which economic,
geopolitical and social systems could take, decades into the future.

In the last four decades, Shell Scenario planners have
highlighted many key world trends and discontinuities, ensuring that
Shell as a business has been able to plan for several eventualities
and maintain business continuity through even the most turbulent
times. For example, the original Scenarios helped Shell's leaders to
prepare for the possibility of an oil price shock - a prescient move
given the Yom Kippur war, which broke out in October 1973.

Jeremy Bentham, Shell's Vice President, Global Business
Environment, said: "Ever since our Scenarios programme began forty
years ago, we have been creating and applying many different
scenarios to anticipate global and local economic, social and
political changes and how they could affect our business.

"Looking to the future, our scenario planners are now developing
a new angle to their work, which recognises the even more complex
nature of the modern world. It will provide clarity and insights by
zooming in on specific details, then zooming out to give a broader
perspective."

The next iteration of the Shell Scenarios, to be published in
early 2013, will focus on areas that are fundamental to the
development of energy and environmental systems in the 21st century.
These include the connection between energy, water and food systems
and the impact of growing global urbanisation.

To mark this major anniversary, we are publishing '40 Years of
Shell Scenarios', a reminder of our Scenarios work over many years
with illustrations of how scenario planning has had a positive impact
on the world in a variety of areas.

Speaking ahead of a panel discussion to coincide with the
booklet's launch today, Simon Henry, Shell's Chief Financial Officer,
said: "Shell has a long and distinguished history of scenario
planning, and the intelligence and innovation that our Scenarios
teams have contributed over many decades has proved hugely beneficial
to our business. By providing unique insights and detailed analysis
into the ever-changing global landscape, and projecting forward
possible outcomes, the Scenarios team helps Shell's senior leadership
make better informed decisions about our current and future
operations."

The Shell Scenarios methodology has been adapted by many
different organisations and individuals worldwide to help them in
their work.

Adam Kahane, Associate Fellow at the Said Business School, Oxford
University said: "The Shell methodology has been one of the main
building blocks for the 'transformative scenario planning' work that
my colleagues and I have been engaged in for the past twenty years.
The spirit of Shell's scenario practice - logical and rigorous,
creative and open - has guided us throughout."

Peter Ho, Senior Advisor for the Centre of Strategic Futures, a
think-tank of the Singapore Government, said: "The Singapore
Government started using scenario planning in 1991. Shell strongly
supported this effort. Today, scenario planning is embedded in the
Government's annual strategic planning cycle."

Philip Bobbit, Herbert Wechsler Professor of Jurisprudence at
Columbia University and Director of Columbia Law School's Center on
National Security, said: "One thing that's always impressed me about
the Shell people was that they did a whole new set of scenarios every
five years, sometimes even less. Yet if you look at all their old
scenarios, they are almost uncanny in showing how the world would
change. Scenario planning is perhaps the most important analytical
tool we have and Shell has been the most important innovator in that
process."

Amory Levins, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Rocky Mountain
Institute, said: "Shell Scenarios are a unique resource for all of us
who think about the energy future. Shell is the most far-sighted and
strategic of the majors, largely because the Scenarios informed the
thinking of Shell leadership and many others in the energy ecosystem.
Without this exercise, people would have a much shorter and dimmer
view of the future than they need to in a very long lead time
business."

Notes to Editors:

For more information about Shell Scenarios, and to download '40
Years of Shell Scenarios', visit
http://www.shell.com/home/content/future_energy/scenarios/40_years.

Royal Dutch Shell plc is incorporated in England and Wales, has
its headquarters in The Hague and is listed on the London, Amsterdam
and New York stock exchanges. Shell companies have operations in more
than 80 countries and territories with businesses including oil and
gas exploration and production; production and marketing of liquefied
natural gas and gas to liquids; manufacturing, marketing and shipping
of oil products and chemicals and renewable energy projects. For
further information, visit http://www.shell.com.

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