Divestment in companies that extract fossil fuels
Fossil fuel divestment or fossil fuel divestment and investment in climate solutions is an attempt to reduce climate change by exerting social, political, and economic pressure for the institutional divestment of assets including stocks, bonds, and other financial instruments connected to companies involved in extracting fossil fuels.
Fossil fuel divestment campaigns emerged on college and university campuses in the United States in 2011 with students urging their administrations to turn endowment investments in the fossil fuel industry into investments in clean energy and communities most impacted by climate change. In 2012, Unity College in Maine became the first institution of higher learning to divest its endowment from fossil fuels.
By 2015, fossil fuel divestment was reportedly the fastest growing divestment movement in history. As of July 2023, more than 1593 institutions with assets totalling more than $40.5 trillion in assets worldwide had begun or committed some form of divestment of fossil fuels.
Divesters cite several reasons for their decisions. To some, it is a means of aligning investments with core values; to others, it is a tactic for combatting the fossil fuel industry; to others, it is a way to protect portfolios from climate-related financial risk. Financial research suggests that, in the longer term, fossil fuel divestment has positively impacted investors' returns.
Motivations for divestment.
Reducing carbon emissions.
Fossil fuel divestment aims to reduce carbon emissions by accelerating the adoption of the renewable energy transition through the stigmatization of fossil fuel companies. This includes putting public pressure on companies that are currently involved in fossil fuel extraction to invest in renewable energy.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found that all future carbon dioxide emissions must be less than 1,000 gigatonnes to provide a 66% chance of avoiding dangerous climate change; this figure includes all sources of carbon emissions. To avoid dangerous climate change, only 33% of known extractable fossil fuel of known reserves can be used; this carbon budget can also be depleted by an increase in other carbon emission sources such as deforestation and cement production. It is claimed that, if other carbon emissions increase significantly, then only 10% of the fossil fuel reserves can be used to stay within projected safe limits.
Furthermore, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency, Earth's average temperature has risen by over the past century, and is predicted to rise another over the next hundred years with continued carbon emission rates. This rise in temperature would far pass the level of warming that scientists have deemed safe to support life on earth.
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Acting on the Paris Agreement.
Toronto Principle.
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The "Toronto Principle" is a fossil fuel divestment strategy, which puts into action the aims set forth at the Paris Agreement in 2015. It was first coined by Benjamin A. Franta, in an article in the Harvard Crimson, as a reference to the University of Toronto's fossil fuel divestment process.
After 350.org submitted a petition for divestment on 6 March 2014, President Gertler established an "ad hoc" Advisory Committee on Divestment from Fossil Fuels. In December 2015, the Committee released a report with several recommendations. Foremost, they argued that "targeted and principled divestment from companies in the fossil fuels industry that meet certain criteria ... should be an important part of the University of Toronto's response to the challenges of climate change." However, the report went further, and allied itself with the Paris Agreement. It recommended that the university divest from companies that "blatantly disregard the international effort to limit the rise in average global temperatures to not more than one and a half degrees Celsius above pre-industrial averages by 2050...These are fossil fuels companies whose actions are irreconcilable with achieving internationally agreed goals."
Franta identified this response as the Toronto Principle, which, as he argues, "aligns rhetoric and action. It suggests that it is all institutions' responsibility to give life to the Paris agreement. Harvard could adopt this Toronto principle, and the world would be better for it." Franta also identified how the Toronto Principle would be put into practice, which includes "moving investments away from coal companies and coal-fired power plants, companies seeking non-conventional or aggressive fossil fuel development (such as oil from the Arctic or tar sands), and possibly also companies that distort public policies or deceive the public on climate. At present, these activities are incompatible with the agreement in Paris." In adhering to the Toronto Principle, Franta argues that leading institutions can use their status and power to meaningfully respond to the challenge of climate change, and act based on the goals at the Paris Agreement.
Ultimately in 2016 the University of Toronto President Meric Gertler rejected his advisory committee's recommendations, leaving the Toronto Principle unimplemented. In November 2021, following continued pressure, President Gertler announced the university's plan to divest by 2030.
Lofoten Declaration.
The Lofoten Declaration (2017) calls for curtailing hydrocarbon exploration and expansion of fossil fuel reserves. It demands fossil fuel divestment and phase-out of use with a just transition to a low-carbon economy. The Declaration calls for early leadership in these efforts from the economies that have benefited the most from fossil fuel extraction.
Economic.
Stranded assets – the carbon bubble.
Stranded assets, which are known in relation to fossil fuel companies as the carbon bubble, occur when the reserves of fossil fuel companies are deemed environmentally unsustainable and so unusable, so must be written off. Currently the price of fossil fuels companies' shares is calculated under the assumption that all of the companies' fossil fuel reserves will be consumed, and so the true costs of carbon dioxide in intensifying global warming is not taken into account in a company's stock market valuation.
In 2013 a study by HSBC found that between 40% and 60% of the market value of BP, Royal Dutch Shell and other European fossil fuel companies could be wiped out because of stranded assets caused by carbon emission regulation. Bank of England governor Mark Carney, speaking at the 2015 World Bank seminar, has stated: "The vast majority of reserves are unburnable" if global temperature rises are to be limited to below 2 °C. In 2019, Carney suggested that banks should be forced to disclose their climate-linked risks within the next two years, and said that more information would prompt investors to penalise and reward firms accordingly. He warned that companies and industries that are not moving towards zero-carbon emissions could be punished by investors and go bankrupt.
In June 2014, the International Energy Agency released an independent analysis on the effect of carbon emissions controls. This estimated that $300 billion in fossil-fuel investments would be stranded by 2035 if cuts in carbon emissions are adopted so that the global mean surface temperature increases by no more than 2 °C.
A report by the Carbon Tracker Initiative found that between 2010 and 2015 the US coal sector had lost 76% of its value including the closure of 200 mines. It found that Peabody Energy, the world's largest private coal mining company, had lost 80% of its share price over this time. This was attributed to Environmental Protection Agency regulations and competition from shale gas.
In 2013, fossil fuel companies invested $670 billion in exploration of new oil and gas resources.
According to research from 2021, about half of the world's fossil fuel assets could be worthless by 2036 under a net zero transition.
Risk of regulation and carbon pricing.
A 2015 report studied 20 fossil fuel companies and found that, while highly profitable, the hidden economic cost to society was also large. The report spans the period 2008–2012 and notes that: "for all companies and all years, the economic cost to society of their CO2 emissions was greater than their after‐tax profit, with the single exception of ExxonMobil in 2008." Pure coal companies fare even worse: "the economic cost to society exceeds total revenue (employment, taxes, supply purchases, and indirect employment) in all years, with this cost varying between nearly $2 and nearly $9 per $1 of revenue." The paper suggests:
This hidden or externalised cost is an implicit subsidy and accordingly represents a risk to those companies. There is a reasonable chance that society will act to either reduce this societal cost by regulating against fossil fuel use or recover it by imposing carbon prices. Investors are increasingly focused on this risk and seeking to understand and manage it.
Similarly, in 2014, financial analyst firm Kepler Cheuvreux projected $28 trillion in lost value for fossil fuel companies under a regulatory scenario that targets 450 parts per million of atmospheric CO2.
Competition from renewable energy sources.
Competition from renewable energy sources may lead to the loss of value of fossil fuel companies due to their inability to compete commercially with the renewable energy sources. In some cases this has already happened. Deutsche Bank predicts that 80% of the global electricity market will have reached grid parity for solar electricity generation by the end of 2017. In 2012, 67% of the world's electricity generation was produced from fossil fuels.
Stanwell Corporation, an electricity generator owned by the Government of Queensland made a loss in 2013 from its 4,000 MW of coal and gas fired generation capacity. The company attributed this loss to the expansion of rooftop solar generation which reduced the price of electricity during the day; on some days the price (usually AU$40–50/MWh) was almost zero. The Australian Government and Bloomberg New Energy Finance forecast the production of energy by rooftop solar to rise sixfold between 2014 and 2024.
Unstable fossil fuel prices.
Unstable fossil fuel prices has made investment in fossil fuel extraction a more risky investment opportunity. West Texas Intermediate crude oil fell in value from $107 per barrel in June 2014 to $50 per barrel in January 2015. Goldman Sachs stated in January 2015 that, if oil were to stabilize at $70 per barrel, $1 trillion of planned oilfield investments would not be profitable.
Morality.
The moral motivation for fossil fuel divestment is based on the belief that it is wrong to profit from willfully and knowingly damaging the planet, and especially so when the impacts those damages are borne disproportionately by those who have benefitted the least from fossil fuel extraction and use. Philosopher and climate justice campaigner Alex Lenferna presents these three interlocking moral arguments in favor of fossil fuel divestment:
Legal.
The legal argument for divestment is the case that as the fossil fuel industry faces long-term structural risks, investors who continue to place bets on it may be breaching their fiduciary duties. In 2021, Harvard University committed to divestment from fossil fuels after facing a legal complaint asserting that its investments violated state laws.
Effects of divestment.
Stigmatization of fossil fuel companies.
A study by the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford found that the stigmatisation of fossil fuel companies caused by divestment can "materially increase the uncertainty surrounding the future cash flows of fossil-fuel companies." That, in turn, "can lead to a permanent compression in the trading multiples – e.g., the share price to earnings (P/E) ratio of a target company."
The study also says that:
 ;templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" / ;The goal of divestment campaigns is to create new global moral norms. These norms can then shift the market as a whole away from fossil fuel investments.
Financial impact.
Recent evidence has suggested that, along with having social impacts, fossil fuel divestment hinders the fossil fuel industry's ability to carry out its business model. Cost of capital for fossil fuel projects have increased in recent years, a trend that fossil fuel companies themselves have attributed in part to divestment pressure.
According to a 2019 analysis by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, the energy sector portion of the S&amp;P 500, which is dominated by fossil fuels, has underperformed the overall index since 1989.
Legal cases.
In November 2014, a group of seven undergraduate, graduate, and law students filed a lawsuit at the Suffolk County Superior Court against the president and fellows of Harvard College and others for "mismanagement of charitable funds" and "intentional investment in abnormally dangerous activities" in relation to Harvard's investments in fossil-fuel companies. In March 2015, the superior court granted Harvard's motion to dismiss. The superior judge wrote: "Plaintiffs have brought their advocacy, fervent and articulate and admirable as it is, to a forum that cannot grant the relief they seek."
In early 2021, students at Harvard and Boston College filed complaints with the Massachusetts Attorney General asserting that fossil