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Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

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Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#91

Post by Nicholas_C »

Diggsey wrote: post #84
colanderman wrote: post #77

Maybe I'm weird. I always thought the purpose of divestment was to stop profiting off of unethical companies, and to eliminate conflicts of interest for value-driven entities such as nonprofits. I'm surprised anyone would treat it as a tool to fight climate change.

Whose voice carries more weight when campaigning to reduce fossil fuel usage: the person who profits off fossil fuels and will suffer as a direct result, or the person who has divested themselves completely? If you have a moral objection to receiving those funds, then just give them to a charity that might actually help. The way economics works, if you choose to divest yourself in this way, you are betting against th…

The problem is if you’re an activist investor you’re not going to buy a bunch of shares and then tell them to stop trashing the environment or else. You might not get support from other investors and your shares would drop.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#92

Post by cwkoss »

randogogogo wrote: post #89
cwkoss wrote: post #87

Bill Gates rarely makes controversial statements like this. I wonder if his PR team specifically contrived this statement to distract from allegations re: Jeffrey Epstein.

I have not gotten the impression anything Jeffrey Epstein related was "sticking" to Bill Gates.

https://twitter.com/search?q=bill%20gates%20epstein&src=type...

~400 tweets containing "bill gates" and "epstein" in the past day

It seems the allegations are not very credible, but PR team may still want to spin story away from it.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#93

Post by lgessler »

This analysis ignores the social significance of divestment (i.e., which might somehow contribute to other actions which are more impactful), though it might still be that even after accounting for this divestment isn't what environmentally-conscious people and organizations should prioritize.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#94

Post by WhatIsDukkha »

So where does the dollar to invest in climate innovation come from if you don't take the dollar out of the fossil fuel stock?

What he said was nonsensical and innumerate. Perhaps its because he has effectively infinite money?

His comment don't really hold up even under basic charity. The dollar in fossil fuels is a dollar not in another industry with a better story for the environment.

The rest of us have a limited pile of dollars to decide with.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#96

Post by TaylorAlexander »

zopa wrote: post #60
thereisnospork wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anything, shouldn't the green contingent buy more stock in oil companies to try and effect a hostile takeover?

That seems very unlikely to be the most cost-effective use of capital. Exon Mobile has a market capitalization of $309 billion. So figure $200 billion for a hostile takeover --- that's approaching the yearly cost of a Green New Deal plans, and you've only taken out one fossil fuel company.

It would make a great 80's style underdog movie though. Some scrappy kid scrapes together $200B to take over Exxon Mobile.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#97

Post by manfredo »

It artificially deflates the demand for equity in fossil fuel companies. Which theoretically would result in lower willingness to invest in fossil fuel ventures. But these companies already exist, and artificial deflation of their stock price won't keep people from fueling up their cars.

I think a better strategy would be conditional investment tied to reduction in emissions. Have a mechanism to buy $X stock at a higher price in exchange for a power company to replace a coal plant with a gas one, or replace a gas plant with a solar farm.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#98

Post by hinkley »

kerkeslager wrote: post #10

I'm pretty unclear on how anyone even thinks divestment works, actually. When a company sells stock in an IPO, buying stock from them allows them to raise capital, so it seems clear to me that you shouldn't buy stock from a fossil fuel company. But that's non-investment, not divestment. Divestment is about selling existing stock. It's true that divestment drives down the stock price. This could mean that if a company…

If I own shares in a retailer and I decide that, say, soda is bad, I can try to use my shareholder rights to talk to them about how prominently they display soda and possibly reducing their shelf real estate for soda.

But what if I own shares of a soda company? What exactly should I do in that case? Try to convince them to exit their primary market and become an entirely different company? Why would I waste my time and energy that way?

It makes absolutely no sense to invest in one kind of company and then insist they become something else. Find another company that is conceptually similar to what you had in mind and invest your time and money in them instead.

Get energy companies to invest in not-coal and not-natural gas, sure, but investing in a petroleum or coal company so you can vote? What exactly do you think you are going to vote for? Suicide?

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#99

Post by zackmorris »

triceratops wrote: post #6

You can't fix a tragedy of the commons with individual action.

Also I would argue that the smug truisms that people spout such as "divestment won't solve climate change" have a very damaging effect on causes that require concerted action by the public.

For example the "Penn & Teller Bull$#!@: Recycling" episode left many viewers under the impression that recycling is a waste of time because it's not mature yet and is sometimes mismanaged. That probably lowered global recycling by some small percentage over several years. A tremendous negative impact in the scheme of things, for a couple guys trying to be funny.

It's generally bad form to undermine causes via pedantry, for example:

* Nobody should listen to Al Gore about global warming because he flies a private jet!

* We can't raise taxes on cigarettes because people will just buy them anyway no matter how much they cost!

* Why bother preventing deforestation when nature does what it wants with forest fires anyway!

Yet we hear these sorts of arguments right here on HN on practically every submission.

Better to at least try to be part of the solution than use criticism as an excuse to do nothing, IMHO.

Re: Fossil fuel divestment has ‘zero’ climate impact, says Bill Gates

#100

Post by facorreia »

gbrown wrote: post #56
bcoates wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it assumes that large investors aren't really passive, but intervene on behalf of their investments. If you convince someone to divest from X, then they have the luxury of remaining neutral when you propose that X be destroyed.

Exactly, carbon regulation will be a lot easier to pass if the direct impact to peoples' finances is lessened.

But some other investor bought the stock, didn't they?
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