BHP Billiton chief executive Andrew Mackenzie says he hopes Donald Trump does not walk away from the agreement reached at last year's climate conference in Paris.
Speaking to shareholders in Brisbane on Thursday, Mr Mackenzie said it was crucial to have the US and China aligned on a climate change response.
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French President: Paris accord is 'irreversible'
During the UN climate climate conference in Marrakech, French President Hollande tells US President-elect Donald Trump that the Paris accord on climate change is "irreversible".
"We do welcome, to be clear at the outset, the agreement that was forged at COP21, we do hope that President Trump doesn't actually tear up the agreement of the United States to support that and also the very strong bond that President Obama and Xi Jinping forged on that because we see this is a strong foundation for future action," he said.
The comments come despite the fact that BHP shares have rallied in the days since Mr Trump was elected to the presidency, based on perceptions that raw materials producers will benefit from Mr Trumps planned infrastructure program in the US, and his support for the coal industry.
Mr Mackenzie is also a passionate advocate for global free trade, which could put him on a collision course with Mr Trump's plans to impose tariffs on Chinese imports and his general hostility toward globalisation.
BHP has long accepted that human actions are exacerbating climate change and that work to reduce that impact must be taken, but the company also believes fossil fuels will have a role to play in global energy supply for a long time, particularly to the developing world.
Storing carbon
The company is investing in carbon capture and storage technology in Australia, Canada and China, with the latter focusing on ways to capture and store greenhouse gas emissions from steel mills.
Mr Mackenzie said one possible dividend from BHP's early commitment to carbon capture storage could be that it is positioned to be a leader in the field longer term.
"There will be money available to people who can find smart ways of storing carbon, this could be a business that the skills of BHP Billiton in the future would be very well placed to add value to your shares, that is a long term thought," he said.
"IÂ have not lost my marbles.. but we have to think what will the great scientists and engineers of BHP Billiton be working on 50 years from now and this is one thing."Â
Mr Mackenzie and the BHP board were fronting Australian shareholders on Thursday for just the second time since last year's Samarco dam disaster which killed 19 people, destroyed towns and affected the environment in the Doce River valley region of Brazil.
The Samarco disaster has prompted BHP to look at ways to improve its oversight of independent joint ventures like Samarco, the Cerrejon coal operation in Colombia and the Antamina base metals mine in Peru.
But Mr Mackenzie said better management oversight may not have stopped the Samarco tragedy.
"There is no way that you could unambiguously say that this accident could have been avoided had you had the governance structure that would be more traditional, like the one at Escondida (copper mine in Chile)," he said.
"Certain things, with hindsight were not done right...there are things we now wish we had done better."
Mr Mackenzie said a bigger round of compensation would be deployed for those affected by Samarco in the new year.
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