25 signatures reached
To: Vice-Chancellor Professor Stuart Corbridge and Durham University Council
Durham University Academics for Fossil Fuel Divestment
We, the undersigned academics and staff, call upon Durham University to divest its investment with the fossil fuel industry, which is putting profit before climate. To go Fossil Free, Durham University will do the following:
a. Screen for and exclude the fossil fuel industry from the university’s investment portfolio
b. Immediately freeze any new investment in fossil fuel companies
c. Divest from the fossil fuel industry and shift funds to positive, ethical investments within 5 years
Why is this important?
At the moment Durham University has an investment policy that states that they won't invest in arms or tobacco companies. But no such policy against investing in fossil fuel companies exists.
Carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels results in the heating of the atmosphere. A rise of more than 2˚C in global temperatures is enough to put the world beyond the acceptable limits as outlined by scientists. Fossil fuel companies already have proven reserves of five times the amount needed to take us past this limit. At the moment the share price of fossil fuel companies is based on the idea that all the reserves held by fossil fuel companies will be burnt. This situation is not viable given the severely detrimental impact it will have on the environment. This disparity between the safely useable reserves and the proven reserves results in fossil fuel companies being not as safe a long-term investment as they are held up to be.
Given the massive amounts of damage fossil fuel companies do to the lives of people around the world, the obvious environmental costs of the industry and the long term instability of fossil fuels as an investment, Durham University People & Planet Society are calling on the university to divest any money it has invested in fossil fuel companies and to add fossil fuels to the list of things in which it will not invest in the future.