CSTJF: behind the scenes of excellence

• A real "showcase" for all the Company’s expertise, in 2024 the CSTJF opened its doors to hundreds of visitors.
• Several foreign delegations - national companies, ministries and R&D partners came to tour the site.
• A meticulous organization that requires the management and combination of many different factors.

"On the Pau Site, the CSTFJ is a technological research and expertise center at the heart of our Company’s energy transition. The world-renowned expertise of our engineers, researchers and our technologies make it a kingpin in this sector. The center is not just a scientific asset, it’s also a means of communication through targeted tours which are an opportunity to demonstrate our knowledge and technological progress upstream of our projects, to forge and develop links with partners and to reinforce our local presence.

The success of these tours is the result of our performances and our teams’ out-and-out commitment to achieve it."

Marc Lirio, Head of Working Environment and Performance Department (CSTJF & PERL)

What is the purpose of the tours

The tours are part of our DNA, an operation that helps meet some of the major challenges for the Company in two different sectors. Relational challenges, with the aim of forging and developing links with partners or strengthening our local presence. And business challenges, to support the decision-making process on certain projects upstream of the signature, or in project development, on technological advances, etc.

The CSTJF has always been a showcase for TotalEnergies’ knowledge and expertise, a flagship of the energy and research industry, and a long-standing presence in the region. Opening the center for tours is an initiative that has developed since the COVID-19 pandemic, which incited TotalEnergies and the various delegations to downscale operations. Today, the groups are smaller and the objectives more clearly defined, for customized tours that can last from a half-day to an entire week, depending on expectations. Environmental awareness and remote communication tools encourage us to give priority to tours where the stakes are high.
 

What is a typical visitor profile?

There are two main categories of visitors depending on the type of tour: oil & gas professionals - engineers, experts, technicians - and the decision-makers, i.e. elected representatives, ministerial delegations, staff from national companies or local partners. Most of the time, the tours are requested by members of executive management in the Company, affiliate directors or the Head of the Pau Site. Once the request has been made, we prepare a program whose content can be either accessible to everyone or extremely detailed and specific, and can include meetings with experts, laboratory tours, discussions with the site manager and departmental managers, meetings, etc.

In 2024, we organized 22 tours for a total of 42 days, and a tour can last anywhere between a half day and an entire week, depending on expectations. Visitors included an Iraqi delegation, the Danish energy authorities for a shared R&D project on CO2 storage, and members of the Namibian ministry of mines and energy (MME), Safran, the Section Paloise rugby team, etc.
 

Why is the CSTFJ a showcase? Which departments and facilities attract the most interest?

The CSTFJ is TotalEnergies’ largest research center, and representative of all our knowledge and expertise. It is a showcase for our expertise in oil & gas and, for a few years now, in renewable energies. In Pau, visitors can talk to experts in reservoir, metering, drilling, wind and solar energy, and tour pioneering facilities. Certain types of expertise attract more interest than others - top of the list in the Top 4 for 2024 was our supercomputer Pangea 3 and 4, second was the RTSC & DrillX - Real Time Support Center for Drilling Smartroom, in third place was the corehouse (voir pour des liens vers actu site) and lastly, the L4 RMC (Recovery Mechanisms Characterization) laboratory (voir pour des liens vers page du site). Depending on the visitors’ profile, the content can be either very general or extremely specific. There are several different levels of security depending on the buildings toured. We are in an environment where the projects and progress in Research & Development make all the difference. Upstream of the tour, we define exactly which aspects need to remain confidential. Visitors are not authorized to tour the premises unaccompanied, as the site is classified for the protection of scientific and technical property. 
 

What are the challenges for TotalEnergies in having visitors tour its sites? In particular the CSTJF in Pau?

Tours are crucial to strengthening financial partnerships, forging lasting relations between people and demonstrating our pioneering spirit in areas such as digitalization, people safety, artificial intelligence, the energy transition, respecting biodiversity, and so on. It is a tangible means of showing the outside world what we do and how we do it as a multi-energy Company, drawing on our values - and on safety in particular - our pioneering spirit, and our quest for top-level performance. PR tours help showcase our regional presence and the expertise developed in the Béarn region, as well as the application of our expertise across the board, with SAFT in Bordeaux, headquarters in Paris, etc.  

We are proud that the CSTJF can play this role in the Company, and the PERL, the second research center of the TotalEnergies Pau site, is just as important and receives many visitors for tours throughout the year.