TotalEnergies has decided to withdraw its representatives from the board of the Russian oil company Novatek, in which it holds a 19.4% stake. Since TotalEnergies cannot sell its stake to Novatek's main shareholders due to Western sanctions, the French energy group will no longer include its 19.4% stake in Novatek in its accounts, leading to an impairment charge of approximately US$3.7bn. In addition, it will no longer include Novatek's reserves, leading to a drop in reported proved reserves of 1.7 Gbl at the end of 2021 (the average reserve on production ration will remain above 11 years of production).
In March 2022, in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, TotalEnergies had decided to no longer provide capital for new projects in Russia and to implement European sanctions, though without exiting its position in the country. Aside from its 19.4% stake in Novatek (626 Mboe of hydrocarbon produced in 2021, including 79.9 bcm of natural gas and 12.3 Mt of liquids), TotalEnergies owns a 20% stake in Yamal LNG, the operator of the 17.4 Mt/year LNG project, and a 10% stake in the 19.8 Mt/year Arctic LNG 2 (3 trains of 6.6 Mt/year), developed by Novatek (60%).