Shell promotes Cecile Wake to the position of chair in Australia
Shell has promoted Cecile Wake as its new Australian chair while incumbent Tony Nunan will take up a role in London as chief of staff to chief executive Wael Sawan.
Energy giant Shell has promoted Arrow Energy boss Cecile Wake to become the multinational’s new Australian chair, and incumbent Tony Nunan is heading to London for a role as chief of staff to global chief executive Wael Sawan.
Ms Wake has been in charge of Shell and PetroChina’s Arrow Energy venture in Queensland since 2020 and will now oversee the company’s sprawling energy operations which make it one of Australia’s biggest foreign investors.
Shell is one of the dominant players in Australia’s energy sector, operating the QCLNG export plant in Queensland, the Prelude floating LNG project off Northern Australia along with stakes in Western Australia’s North West Shelf, Gorgon and Browse LNG ventures and gas business Arrow.
Current Shell Australia East boss Godson Njoku will in April succeed Ms Wake as chief executive of Arrow Energy.
Mr Nunan took on the top role for Shell in Australia at the start of 2020, replacing Zoe Yujnovich who has since risen up the ranks to become head of the company’s newly combined upstream and integrated gas business.
Mr Nunan will take up the newly created role in London of chief of staff and corporate relations, reporting to Shell chief executive Wael Sawan, and focused on delivery of strategic agenda for Mr Swan and Shell’s executive committee.
Australia is treated by a raft of global energy majors as a senior posting for executives to gain operational experience before taking on top management roles back at company headquarters.
Ms Wake endured a testing time at Arrow navigating landholders in Queensland. Last year the state’s GasFields Commission called on all stakeholders to “urgently act’’ to resolve their differences over the $10 billion Surat gas project near Dalby on the western Darling Downs.
“Shell has supplied Australians with energy for their homes and businesses for more than 120 years and I am honoured to lead Shell Australia at such a critical time, with a high-performing portfolio that stretches across gas, power and increasingly renewables,” Ms Wake said on Thursday.
The new Shell Australia boss will enter the job at a testing time for the industry amid the Albanese government’s intervention into the gas industry.
The government’s current measures include a 12-month $12 per gigajoule price cap on new domestic gas supplies, implemented last December, with a mandatory code of conduct also on the cards which will include a “reasonable pricing” clause.