The narrative construction of risk in Petrobras’ sustainability reports

Abstract

This article examines the problem of risk, with a focus on environmental and climate issues in the context of late modernity. It focuses on how organisations, especially in the oil sector, address environmental controversies through communication strategies and legitimation narratives, emphasising sustainability to reinforce their social commitment. The study focuses on the Brazilian oil company Petrobras, known for its environmental impact and controversies, especially leaks and accidents. The article explores how Petrobras officially communicates about environmental risks, using sustainability reports as a legitimisation strategy in relation to ESG (Environment, Social and Governance) standards. The methodology adopted is reflexive and critical, based on an analysis of Petrobras' sustainability reports over the last ten years (2012-2022).

Petrobras was founded in Brazil in 1953, its origins date back to the search for economic independence in the energy sector and, during its almost sixty years of existence, the organization has gained international recognition in the oil and derivatives sector (Santos, 2021), but has also been at the center of several controversies, especially for the numerous leaks, disasters and environmental accidents (Santos et al., 2012). In this context, ESG (Environment, Social and Governance) highlights the importance of environmental, social and governance factors in financial markets throughout the global sphere. ESG rankings are also known as sustainability rankings or corporate social responsibility ratings. In this regard, the relevance of ESG reports has increased in recent years as they are linked to practices that strengthen sustainable economic development. However, organizations with simpler business models and proportionally lower impacts can measure a small number of relevant factors in terms of socio-environmental risks and opportunities. As the complexity of the business increases, the metric used should become more sophisticated to ensure that the measurement is as close as possible to the real impact.

Those with a higher risk in relation to biodiversity loss, for example, are configured as a higher market risk, have lower liquidity in their shares and have an impact on financial institutions, causing instability in a country’s economy and financial system if its governance is “weak” (Jacobi, 2012). These organizations must seek tools to combat biodiversity loss by mapping risks and for this, they require strategic organizational communication (Kunsch, 2016). In this sense, we are interested here in observing the approach to environmental risk officially communicated by Petrobras, since the oil sector corresponds to one of the segments with the highest rates of environmental pollution / contamination and the way in which these organizations build their reports on their practices in favor of sustainable development becomes, nowadays, important strategies of social legitimation focused on ESG standards. To do this, the methodology adopts a reflexive and critical perspective, based on bibliographic and documentary research, whose analytical corpus focuses on Petrobras' sustainability reports of the last ten years. Our research objective being "to analyze the official construction of the organizational narrative (Santos, 2022) on the approach to environmental risk by the Brazilian company.

From the preliminary analysis of Petrobras' sustainability reports, from 2012 to 2022, we observe an approach that tends to "naturalize" and "relativize" the risk and to emphasize, above all, the measures taken by the organization to "control" it.