10 signatures reached
To: Chancellor Linda Brady & Board of Trustees
Fossil Free UNCG
We call upon you to divest the University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s endowment from the top 200 fossil fuel companies and reinvest in socially and environmentally responsible funds.
In 2011 Chancellor Brady signed the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment (ACUPCC) “pledging the University to develop a strategic plan to achieve climate neutrality (uncg.edu).”
UNCG needs to be the leader it says it will be by becoming one of the first schools in the Southeast region to divest from fossil fuels, setting an example for other universities in the area and across the country. The fossil fuel industry creates an impending threat to our communities and environment. Therefore our university should take a stand by pulling our investments from this destructive industry.
Our communities, environment and future are threatened by rising global temperatures caused by the burning of fossil fuels. Therefore we believe our university should not be invested in corporations which are involved in the extraction, production, or distribution of fossil fuels.
We demand that UNCG immediately freeze fossil fuel investments and divest its endowment from the fossil fuel industry within five years in order to reduce the fossil fuel industry’s hold on our finances and halt further environmental damage due to climate change. Divesting from fossil fuels would be an action showing that UNCG is truly intent on reaching climate neutrality.
Why is this important?
Climate change is accelerating. We are witnessing the increasing impacts of a warming planet more and more consistently; in this last year alone our country experienced record-breaking heat, droughts, and hurricanes, which impacted hundreds of thousands of people and cost our country hundreds of billions of dollars. Hurricane Sandy alone caused $50 billion in damages. Experts agree that global warming caused by humans burning fossil fuels will continue to accelerate and intensify these tragic climate disasters. The scientific consensus is clear and overwhelming; we cannot safely burn even half of global fossil-fuel reserves without dangerously warming the planet for several thousand years.