Her career at Shell soon revolves around the production of liquid gas, LNG. For many years she works in Australia and Malaysia, after which in 2007 she returns to the Netherlands to become Global Manager LNG & Gas Processing. As vice-president LNG (since 2009) she is responsible among other things for all the R&D and the design of the Prelude FLNG, a 480-meter-long floating LNG plant. In an interview in Maritiem Nederland she says in 2014 that she would probably have had the fright of her life if many years ago she had known that she would one day come this far. She laughs when the comment crops up again. “I live by the day, in the job that I have”, she explains. “That is how my personality is made up. It is true that I am ambitious, in the sense that I want to do interesting things, but I have never attached any value to the rank of seniority that I reached.”

Van Loon thinks that the working atmosphere at Shell has also contributed to her success. “A lot of attention is devoted to the development and the quality of women and other minorities on the shop floor. I find that very important, because I have experienced myself that this can make a person quite successful. I belong to one of the first generations in which part-time work was introduced when the children are still young. Shell was one of the first companies where that was possible. Later I made an international step, doubting whether I would pull it off. I was given a lot of encouragement at the time: just try it and if there are any problems, surely we can help.”

It is always difficult, interviewing a woman in a high position without starting about the fact that she is a woman. Once it is announced that Van Loon is going to be the new CEO of Shell Nederland, the Algemeen Dagblad headlines read without any embarrassment: “Merry Marjan runs Shell and her family without any stress” – as if that was not true for her male predecessor. Other media, too, emphasize with amazement that Van Loon “is not a man” and hence “does not come from the old boys’ network”. Van Loon does not seem to be bothered by that. It is an aspect that she really enjoys discussing, hoping that more young women will follow her example. “I think that role models are important. I have always done what I enjoyed doing, but I have also always found it very important apart from my work to spend time on my family, on friends, on hobbies. They also have to fit into my life. For me that has never been a barrier. I have noticed that women are relieved when they hear that they can have a life too when they carve out a career.”

“Sustainable energy sources must first become reliable and affordable”

As CEO of Shell Nederland Van Loon wants to work together with other parties really hard to bring about the transition to a sustainable energy supply in our country. Van Loon thinks that this calls for a combination of urgent action, realism and long-term planning from governments and trade and industry alike. “The transition to sustainable energy sources is an enormous challenge”, she says. “It requires unprecedented cooperation, investments and innovation. Shell is an energy company that is founded on innovation. We know a great deal about the carriers and the users of energy and we want to utilize that knowledge to play an active role in that transition.”

Shell sees an important role for gas and wind in the Dutch energy transition and wants to make a contribution to it as well. That intention was shown by the bid made by Shell, Uneco and Van Oord jointly for the tender of the new wind farms Borssele 1 and 2 in the North Sea. And Shell is also involved in a residual heat project in Rotterdam. The tender for Borssele 1 and 2 was not won by Shell. “Is Shell going to bid for other tenders in the Netherlands? Stay tuned, I would say. We are also interested in projects elsewhere in Europe and the world. In that sense the loss of the Borssele tender does not make so much difference. You do not make everything dependent on a single project.”

Nevertheless, the company is not really known to be a driver of green energy. Better still, when the multinational recently announced the strategy for the coming years, the company seemed to look at opportunities for growth in particular in the extraction of gas and oil from the deep sea and petrochemistry. Not really what one would call green intentions.

“Sustainable energy sources must first become reliable and affordable”, says Van Loon in defense of the plans. “Until then we will need large quantities of fossil fuels, so it will take research to achieve low dioxide emissions with those as well. While sustainable energy is still just a small portion, it is growing and we are going to expand that further.”

In a new division, New Energies, a number of different units have been merged to achieve this. “It is not a question of and/or, but of both/and. Shell has clearly positioned itself as a company that wants to play its role in the energy transition. At different places, in different ways and at different speeds.”