Today, Harvard University students are calling on Harvard President Drew Faust to divest Harvard’s endowment from fossil fuel extraction companies with a day of action outside her office. As a Harvard alum, I am proud of the current students and faculty pushing Harvard to be a climate leader. As an advocate at the Natural Resources Defense Council, I see this escalation as extremely timely, with the announcement yesterday about NRDC’s partnership with BlackRock and FTSE Group, the global index provider, to launch the first stock market index to exclude fossil fuel extraction companies. As Frances Beinecke wrote in her blog yesterday, this new stock market index “will help ensure that climate-conscious investors can match their financial interests with their values.” Fossil fuels such as tar sands oil, along with other sources of oil, gas, and coal cause significant greenhouse gas emissions; it’s critical that we do everything possible to move away from fossil fuels and towards clean energy.
In an open letter from earlier this month entitled “Confronting Climate Change,” President Faust writes:
“… we have far more work ahead to chart the path from societies and economies fundamentally dependent on fossil fuels to a system of sustainable and renewable energy. We must devote ourselves to enabling and accelerating that transition—by developing the technologies, policies and practices that would make it possible—if we are to mitigate the damage that rising greenhouse gas levels are inflicting on the planet.”
The new index fund should make it far easier for Harvard to align its investment portfolio with these values – either by investing in this fund, creating a similar fund of their own, or any number of other strategies.
As witnessed this weekend in Washington, DC at the Reject and Protect march and ceremony, there is a strong, diverse, and growing movement to move away from tar sands oil and other dirty fuels, and towards clean energy. Tar sands cause 17% more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional oil, and all fossil fuels cause far more climate changing emissions than clean energy like wind and solar power. In their extraction, transportation, refining, and combustion, fossil fuels also cause pollution to the air we breathe, the water we drink, and hazards to human health. While we aren’t going to get off of all fossil fuels immediately, Harvard should embrace and become a leader of this movement to move towards clean energy as quickly as possible, which means investing in the clean energy of the future, not the dirty energy of the past.
While Harvard’s investments in clean energy and policy research initiatives are commendable, we need more; divesting its large endowment from fossil fuel extraction companies and reducing emissions on campus are equally critical. If you’re reading my blog and haven’t already, you can tell President Obama to reject the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and tell President Faust to divest Harvard from the fossil fuel extraction industry.
This blog is part of the Daily Kos Harvard University Divest blogathon.
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Harvard Divest Blogathon - April 30, 2014
On April 30, students from Harvard University will form a blockade outside President Drew Faust's office in support of divestment from fossil fuel. To support this student-led protest, the Daily Kos Blogathon Team is joining hands with Divest Harvard Students and a coalition of NGOs - 350.org, Forecast the Facts, Better Future Project, and Credo - and seeking your help. Please sign this petition and urge your coworkers, friends, and family members to do the same.
Harvard Divests: Harvard students leading the fossil fuel divestment movement at Harvard, @DivestHarvard
More than 100 Harvard faculty members have signed a letter demanding that the Harvard Corporation — which manages the largest educational endowment in the world — commit to divesting from the fossil fuel industry.
President Drew Faust committed to new investment standards after a multi-year student-led campaign — but she stopped short of full divestment. Now, more than 100 members of the faculty are firing back with an open letter, building immense pressure on Faust to go further — and more are signing on by the day.
Harvard divested from South African apartheid and Big Tobacco in the past — and now ten universities have already pledged to divest from fossil fuels. A strong show of support from the climate movement now would super-charge the growing campaign to set a game-changing precedent.
Sign the petition and stand with Harvard's faculty, students, and alumni for Divestment!
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