Divest from Fossil Fuels 

Image courtesy of Robert S. Donovan is unmodified and licensed under CC BY 3.0.

Your investments or your retirement plan may include money in companies that mine and market fossil fuels: coal, oil, and gas. 

Fossil fuels contribute to global warming. Through divesting from these companies, we can reduce harmful emissions into the atmosphere that are responsible for the rise in fires, droughts, floods, and devastation. You can divest your own savings from fossil fuels, and call on cities, states, and organizations to divest their assets. 

The content on this page is not intended as financial advice and we recommend people consult with professional advisors before making changes to their investments. 

Actions

1. Divest your savings from fossil fuels

Time: 60+ minutes 

Divest your 401(k), retirement, or other investment accounts from fossil fuel companies.

1. Use Fossil Free Funds to look up if your savings are invested in fossil fuel companies. 
2. Reference Fossil Free Funds’ top-rated funds and identify more environmentally friendly investments. 
   

2. Email your city council members

Time: 10 minutes 

Ask your local elected officials to pass a resolution divesting city funds from fossil fuel companies.

1. Search online if your city has previously passed a resolution to divest funds from fossil fuel companies. 
2. Find your council members’ contact information on your city’s website. 
3. Use or modify our email template to send to your council members.

3. Ask an organization to divest

Time: 10 minutes 

Ask leaders at an organization you support or are a part of to divest from fossil fuel companies. This might be a faith community, non-profit, university, etc. 

1. Search online for the names and contact information for members of the organization’s governing body. 
2. Alternatively, contact community members you know who have important connections with the organization. 
3. Use or modify our email template to send to organization leaders. 

Learn more 

The Background: Apartheid. The harsh policies of apartheid, or institutionalized racial separation, began in South Africa in 1948 and persisted for nearly half a century. Apartheid endured despite protests on moral and ethical grounds, but it finally crumbled in the face of economic dis-investment, or divestment.  In a movement that began in the early 1960s and became very powerful by the 1980s, more than 200 colleges and universities, businesses, and organizations around the world, including UN bodies and the European community, withdrew financial support from enterprises in South Africa.

Protest Divestment: Purpose and Outcomes. This movement was known as protest divestment.  The simple act of selling off stock in certain companies raises awareness, generates negative publicity for organizations and their policies, and creates powerful incentives for positive social change.

Fossil Fuel Divestment. Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu advocated for divestment during the anti-apartheid struggle. He has now called for an anti-apartheid-style boycott and divestment campaign against the fossil fuel industry for driving global warming.

Unity College in Maine, in 2012, became the first institution to divest from fossil fuel companies.  Since that small beginning, the protest divestment movement has become the largest of its kind.

By June 2021, a total of 1,326 institutions and over 58,000 individuals representing $14.58 trillion in assets worldwide had sold off their stocks in fossil fuel companies, including state public pension funds, England’s National Trust, religious institutions large and small; philanthropic foundations; colleges and universities from Edinburgh to Sydney to Honolulu; over forty major Catholic institutions; many of the world’s great art museums, insurance companies, the country of Ireland, the city of New York, and the American Medical Association.

In August 2021, the State of Maine became the first in the country to divest from fossil fuels. Maine’s divestment law requires the state cash pool and the Maine Public Employee Retirement System to sell off $1.3 billion from coal, oil, and gas companies by 2026.

Why participate?

• The moral reason is clear. Our grandchildren will inherit a world plagued with fires, droughts, floods, and crippling heat, all of which endanger supplies of food and water, exacerbate lethal diseases, and generate deadly conflict over land and resources. Women and girls are most vulnerable to the impact of the climate crisis. UN data show that 90% of the people displaced by climate catastrophes are women, who then face a lack of food, shelter, and care, and they often become victims of sexual violence.
• The financial reason is clear. Fossil fuels are no longer good investments. Blackrock, the world’s largest investment fund manager, is leaving fossil fuels behind and committing to sustainable energy.
• The anti-racist reason is clear. The fossil fuel industry perpetuates racial injustice and environmental racism.  An NAACP report shows that 68% of African Americans live within 30 miles of a coal-fired power plant, a reality that is tied to increased birth defects, heart disease, asthma, and lung disease – conditions that also make African Americans more susceptible to Covid-19 and other lethal diseases. Climate change is a force multiplier for the racial inequalities at the heart of the Black Lives Matter protests.

Protest Divestment Works. In response to divestment, fossil fuel companies diversify their businesses or shut down altogether. A report from Genus Capital Management reports that fossil-free funds outperform a benchmark of standard stock market indices year after year.

To learn more about the connection between the climate crisis and racism click here.

To view educational resources on divestment click here.

Climate Change, Racism, and Environmental Injustice

Climate change is a ‘force multiplier’ of racism. Climate change exacerbates the realities of racial inequity that Black, Indigenous, and people of color in America face. In the current political environment, where so many across the world urge increased racial justice, a key point of change lies within climate advocacy.

There are two important ways that climate change works to exacerbate racial inequality.

First, climate injustice mirrors the realities of racial inequality. As Bill McKibben, founder of the advocacy organization 350.org, wrote, “Having a racist and violent police force in your neighborhood is a lot like having a coal-fired power plant in your neighborhood. And having both?” This question illustrates the two sides of oppression that the majority of African American neighborhoods face. Although only 13% of the U.S. population is Black, nearly 40% of people living within three miles of a coal plant are Black, and, of the people living within three miles of the 75 coal plants with the highest levels of toxic emissions, 53% are people of color. They are disproportionately exposed to harsh airborne toxins that are linked to increased asthma attacks, heart problems, dangerously-high blood pressure, and cancer – all of which can also be caused by social determinants of ill health due to life under an unequal criminal justice system and exclusion from equal social benefits.

Climate injustice both mirrors and compounds the negative realities of racial injustice. The combination of both environmental and political discrimination for communities of color is profound. In the United States, Blacks are three times as likely to die from asthma as the rest of the population. The physical health and safety of minorities are also endangered by police techniques, as evidenced in the murders of George Floyd and Eric Garner, among others. Exposure to disproportionate airborne toxins and higher levels of sanctioned violence illuminate a double-edged sword for people of color in the United States – a sword that is sharpened by a global pandemic that disproportionately affects people of color.

To learn more about the connection between climate change and racism, see the New York Times interactive database.

It is time to respond to the systemic inequalities faced by people of color in the United States. Divestment is a powerful tool that people can use to stand up against the climate crisis. Divestment, taking money out of companies that cause climate change, will help to alleviate racial injustice.

Divestment is a path to greater racial and climate justice in the United States. Check out our action steps for more information on how to encourage divestment from fossil fuel businesses that profit disproportionately at the cost of communities of color in America and abroad.

Updated September 2023.