The fossil fuel divestment movement has been growing for years and the reasons become more and more compelling. Tim Buckley from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis talks about the financial risk of stranded assets rather than using words like climate change or carbon, but that’s the bottom line. The Sydney Morning Herald reported on December 26 one of the nation’s biggest investors, Australian Super, “has asked the chairmen of the nation's biggest banks how they are responding to carbon exposure risk, as lenders face growing pressure over their response to climate change”.
This follows announcements from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the White House and 20 private sector firms in the US that promised to move $1.5 billion to cleaner and more socially responsible investments. The executive director of the UN Green Climate Fund established to redistribute money from developed to developing nations and help them adapt to climate change recently announced fossil fuels will be excluded from funding and renewables will be prioritized. The draft plan for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change going forward to Paris in December 2015 includes an important provision to phase carbon emissions to net zero by the end of the century.
Other investment firms, pension funds, cities, churches and universities have seen the writing on the wall and gone fossil free. Don’t be left with stranded assets. Check with your investment advisor where that money goes to grow. If you need help, 350.org has developed targeted divestment strategies for colleges, governments, religious institutions and individuals with strong results.
http://gofossilfree.org/
http://www.smh.com.au/business/banking-and-finance/australian-super-calls-on-banks-to-assess-climate-change-risk-20141224-12d16q.html#ixzz3N1X17q8A
http://www.sierraclub.org/compass/2014/12/conclusion-cop20-paves-way-paris
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/12/10/green-climate-fund_n_6300346.html?ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000048