Climate Action: Move Your Money & Switch Your Credit Card
One Friday night in the fall of 2012 I found myself in a room at Amherst College with Bill McKibben, a good number of college students, and some local residents, many of them in their later years. I was only just beginning to really pay attention to the issue of climate change and thought of myself as a visitor or observer in this gathering. McKibben looked like a very ordinary guy, but once he started to speak, the power of his vision and persuasion transformed the room. At that point, no college or other institution had committed to divest from fossil fuels, but McKibben announced his intention to start a nation-wide divestment movement.
It seemed unlikely that such a movement could have much impact on an industry as wealthy as the fossil fuel industry. McKibben explained that he didn’t expect to bankrupt the industry, but rather to cause them to be seen as moral pariahs for their climate-destroying business model and to delegitimize the power they wield through political donations. He thought college students and alumni could effectively pressure colleges and universities to divest, and he announced a cross-country tour to enlist them. This made sense to me and I soon wrote to my alma maters encouraging them to divest from fossil fuels.
Fast forwarding to the present … the divestment movement that Bill McKibben announced in Amherst that night has grown. More than 1500 institutions–colleges, pension funds, faith-based organization, etc.– whose investments total more than $40 trillion, have ….
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