Banking with Aspiration makes good dollars and sense!

From an Article by Sami Grover, Treehugger Blog, December 19, 2018

It’s been amazing to watch how the fossil fuels divestment movement has grown in a few short years. When Harvard students voted to divest back in 2012, for example, the conversation was mostly about undermining Big Energy’s social license to operate. A year later, when Bill McKibben made the case for divestment he focused mostly on the idea of churches, universities and other symbolic institutions making these companies ‘pariahs’.

Now, in honor of the 1,000th institution signing up to divest (bringing the total value to nearly $8 trillion), Bill McKibben has an excellent update on the state of the movement over at The Guardian. While the symbolism of all this still matters, says the maestro, it’s also becoming clear that divestment has become a very real financial force in and of itself:

Peabody, the world’s biggest coal company, announced plans for bankruptcy in 2016; on the list of reasons for its problems, it counted the divestment movement, which was making it hard to raise capital. Indeed, just a few weeks ago analysts at that radical collective Goldman Sachs said the “divestment movement has been a key driver of the coal sector’s 60% de-rating over the past five years”. [...] Now the contagion seems to be spreading to the oil and gas sector, where Shell announced earlier this year that divestment should be considered a “material risk” to its business.

Indeed, no sooner does McKibben write this piece than Cleantechnica reports that Westmoreland, the 6th largest coal company in the US, is filing for bankruptcy too.

True, divestment is hardly the only reason certain fossil fuel companies are in trouble. 42% of coal plants are losing money already, and that figure is only going to get worse as renewables get cheaper and polluting gets more expensive. Similarly, Big Oil may not be sweating the Tesla Model 3 just yet, but there’s a growing list of diverse threats that could soon converge to put a dent in demand.

And that’s the thing: Incumbents seem invincible until one day they are not. And anyone who knows anything about climate change is beginning to realize that there is no sane, sustainable or morally justifiable version of the future in which we continue to burn fossil fuels any longer than we have to. As Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England, has said: Most fossil fuels are unburnable. And that makes them basically worthless.

Investors would do well to take note.

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Greeting in the New Year, from Aspiration, January 4, 2019

It’s Day 4 of sticking to your New Year’s resolutions. How are things going so far?

We can’t help you cut back on sugary drinks or screen time, but if “do more good” and “save more money” made your 2019 list, that’s something we can help with.

Resolution #1: Send a message to Big Banks and Washington.

Big Banks use your money to lobby Washington for dangerous deregulation and fund dirty oil projects like the Dakota pipeline. The White House has proven to be a willing partner.

Greedy people have reason to smile these days, but you can fight back: You can move your money to fossil-fuel free banking products with Aspiration. Imagine hundreds of thousands of Americans leaving the Big Banks behind. It’ll wipe the smiles off their faces faster than the president can tweet something ridiculous.

Do Well. Do Good. SIGN UP NOW

Resolution #2: Spend less money and save more money

We can definitely help here, with the Aspiration Account.

Aspiration puts an extra $300 a year in the average person’s pocket compared to their current Big Bank. It’s FDIC-insured, has zero ATM fees worldwide, no overdraft fees, and offers a whopping 1.00% APY interest (that’s up to 100x Big Bank rates). That means your 2019 earnings will end up in your pockets, not your bank’s profits.

Save More Money! SIGN UP WITH ASPIRATION

Resolution #3: Make the world a better place for everyone

The Aspiration Impact Measurement app helps you spend to match your values at companies that treat their people and the planet well. We also have fossil-fuel free investment options and commit to donating 10% of their earnings back to charity.

A Better Banking Experience! OPEN AN ACCOUNT WITH ASPIRATION

Helping people do well and do good—that’s Aspiration’s resolution this year, and every year. Let us help you with yours. Join the hundreds of thousands of people who are making the switch to Aspiration.

Thank you, Andrei Cherny, Founder & CEO, Aspiration

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NOTE: Amalgamated Bank embraces socially responsible causes

Essay by Bill McKibben, New Yorker, November 26, 2018

Dear Friends and Concerned Citizens,

Every once in a great while, I write a piece that I think is important to share. This time it’s an essay in this week’s New Yorker (actually, a sneak preview of my new book that will be out in the spring). In it I try to offer some perspective on where we are, 30 long hot years after I wrote The End of Nature.

“How Extreme Weather Is Shrinking the Planet”| The New Yorker, November 26, 2018

I warn you, it’s not all easy reading. In fact, given the horrific fires still burning in California, an almost literal pall hangs over the words. But I want you to know I write it from a place of engagement, not despair–I won’t give up, and I know you won’t either. Movement building demands honesty, and hence my essay, but it also demands the courage to face facts and fight on.

And we do have much to be thankful for: our young colleagues from the Sunrise Movement who have been doing great work persuading the new Congress to take up a Green New Deal, for instance, and the scenes from London where people are taking to the streets in an aptly-named Extinction Rebellion.

Take a moment to read my new piece in the New Yorker, and then share it with your friends.

So perhaps you could do me the favor of reading this essay, and sharing it with some others who you think might appreciate it. And then back to the fight!

With thanks,

Bill McKibben, www.350.org

Article by Bill McKibben, www.350.org

Dear Friends:  “Let’s Win the War on Warming” is in the New Republic this month.

Read my new article in the New Republic about how to fight and win the war on global warming.

Every once in a while I write something that seems worth sharing. Four years ago it was an essay in Rolling Stone about the new math of global warming that helped trigger the divestment movement. Today it’s a piece in The New Republic about the war—the literal war—that global warming has become.

We’re used to metaphors: the war on drugs, the war on poverty. But in this case carbon and methane—without malice but also without mercy—are waging a war on the civilization that emitted them. This year we’ve lost huge swaths of the world’s coral; vast sheets of ice disappear daily. Our adversary is taking territory and taking lives. 

So what would it mean to fight back? Most of the piece is devoted to that possibility: thanks to the engineers who have driven down the cost of renewables, we’re at the first moment where that’s a possibility. If we wanted to, we could—as a world—replicate the industrial miracle that won World War II. Instead of bombers we’d build turbine blades; in place of planes, solar panels. The reporting in the piece shows that putting up enough renewables to get us back on the path to 350 parts per million is possible—barely.

Thanks to researchers like Stanford’s Mark Jacobson, there’s a plan for every state and most nations; the question is, can we build for the future with as much commitment as we once built for war? The answer to that question is in our hands.

I hope you’ll read and share this piece while this odd election season drags on; please share it with your friends and family and Facebook crew so that we can build the peaceful army we badly need. 

By winter, our movement will be pushing harder than ever. Not just for change but for change on the scale we need.

Onward, Bill McKibben for 350.org

P.S. If you want a sense of what this war looks like today, here are some pictures from Louisiana where completely unprecedented flooding has now killed 7 and forced 20,000 rescues from homes, cars, and hospitals. As in any war, we need to take care of the people being impacted: relief efforts can be directed here. And Louisiana is not the only place. We’re also thinking of our colleagues in sprawling Manila today, where flooding has also claimed lives and left thousands in evacuation centers.

On a more hopeful note, brave fighters in North Dakota are taking a remarkable stand right now against a new pipeline planned for the edge of the Standing Rock Sioux reservation. Donate to their legal fund here.

"Breakfree 2016" @ www.350.org

Four (4) Reasons Why It’s Time to Break Free

From an Article by Annie Leonard, EcoWatch.com, May 11, 2016

With the presidential campaign dominating the news cycle, it’s easy to get distracted from what our current administration is doing—and not doing—to tackle climate change. We can’t afford to wait and see what the election brings. That’s why communities from the Gulf South to Alaska and around the globe are uniting in an incredible wave of resistance to fossil fuels this week.

Climate activists gathered in Anchorage, Alaska last month to speak out against offshore drilling in the U.S. Arctic. Photo credit: Mark Meyer / Greenpeace

Here’s why taking action matters:

1. Business as usual for the fossil fuel industry cannot continue.

The consequences of our reliance on dirty energy are no secret, but that hasn’t stopped fossil fuel companies from going to extremes to protect their bottom lines.

Exxon, for one, knew the climate impacts of burning fossil fuels 40 years ago. But instead of acting in the interest of humanity, the company campaigned in secret to cover up climate science so it could continue to plunder and pollute in search of more oil to burn.

Not to be outdone, Shell spent three years and $7 billion trying to drill in U.S. Arctic waters, a campaign that ended in a very public, ego-bruising failure in 2015. But the company is still clinging to its Arctic drilling hopes by a thread, relinquishing all but one of its Alaskan leases on Tuesday.

What do these two stories have in common? People power winning out over corporate greed. Thanks to tireless activism, Exxon is finally taking its scandal seriously, deploying the full force of its lawyers and lobbyists. And the movement that pressured Shell to leave the Arctic also prompted President Obama to protect Alaska from offshore drilling through 2017 and make the Atlantic off limits through 2022.

2. The path to a sustainable future does not include fossil fuels.

If we have any hope of preventing runaway climate change, we need to keep fossil fuels in the ground—starting now.

A 2015 study in the journal Nature revealed that we need to leave at least 80 percent of the world’s known remaining fossil fuel reserves untouched, including more than 90 percent of U.S. coal reserves and a whopping 100 percent of Arctic oil and gas.

In the U.S. alone, keeping publicly owned fossil fuels in the ground would cut greenhouse gas emissions by 100 million metric tons per year.

Of course, communities on the frontlines of the fight against fossil fuels have known this for years, but policymakers are just starting to catch up.

3. Actions speak louder than words.

If last year’s Paris climate talks showed us anything, it’s that the world’s political leaders are ready to talk the talk on climate action.

But are they ready to walk the walk? So far, the answer is no.

President Obama, for example, said last year, “As long as I am president, America will lead the world to meet this threat [climate change] before it’s too late.”

But his actions aren’t on pace with the change we need. He’s failed to protect the U.S. Arctic and the Gulf of Mexico from offshore drilling and his Interior Department Secretary Sally Jewell called the keep it in the ground movement “naive” in a recent speech.

If you think it’s “naive” to preach climate action one minute then turn around and sell our public land to the highest bidder the next, then it’s time to speak up!

4. Momentum for a clean energy revolution is on our side.

Breaking free from fossil fuels won’t happen overnight, but we’re far beyond square one. People power has already stopped major projects like the Keystone XL pipeline and forced Shell to abandon immediate Arctic drilling plans.

And we didn’t stop there.

This series of wins is no accident—it’s because people like you and me are uniting around one clear message. We only have one choice to protect our future: keep fossil fuels in the ground.

From financial stress to increased pressure from people like you, the fossil fuel industry is reeling. Right now is our best chance to turn up the heat and make 2016 a tipping point in the journey towards a clean, just, renewable energy future.

Communities all over the country—from Alaska to the Gulf South—have already pushed us closer and closer to this tipping point. Now it’s time to build on their actions and break free from fossil fuels for good.

Sound like a movement you want to be a part of?

Find a Break Free action near you and get involved.

See also:  www.FrackCheckWV.net

COP21 -- Paris (December 2015)

United Nations Conference on Climate Change — Paris 2015

Dear Friends of the Earth:                     Date — December 12, 2015

Today is a historic day: as tens of thousands of people filled the streets of Paris, politicians finalized a major new global climate agreement. (See also:  www.350.org)

The deal in Paris includes an agreement to limit global warming to below 2 degrees Celsius, with an aim of 1.5 degrees, and achieve climate ‘neutrality’ that will require phasing out fossil fuels soon after mid-century. That’s not what we hoped for, but it’s still a deal that sends a signal that it’s time to keep fossil fuels in the ground, and for investors to cut their ties with coal, oil and gas by divesting.

This deal represents important progress — but progress alone is not our goal. Our goal is a just and livable planet.

If followed to the letter, the agreement leaves far too many people exposed to the violence of rising seas, stronger storms and deeper drought. It leaves too many loopholes to avoid serious action — despite the heroic efforts from leaders of vulnerable nations and communities who fought for a deal in line with science.

But the coal, oil and gas corporations of the world should take little comfort. That 2 degree pledge would require keeping 80% of the world’s remaining fossil fuels underground, a 1.5 degree target even more — and countries are required to come back to the table every 5 years to increase their ambition in reaching those goals.

Paris isn’t the end of the story, but a conclusion of a particular chapter. Now, it’s up to us to strengthen these promises, make sure they are kept, and then accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels and towards 100% renewable energy.

As world leaders in Paris were finalizing the text of the deal, thousands of people returned to the streets of Paris to demonstrate their commitment to continue the fight:

They were joined by hundreds of solidarity actions around the world, all echoing the same message: it’s up to us to keep fossil fuels in the ground.

Standing together, flowers in hand, we formed red lines in the street — because lines have to be drawn in this fight for justice, and it’s up to all of us to stand on the side of those on the front lines of this crisis.

More lines are being drawn everywhere against the true villain of the last two weeks: the fossil fuel industry, which has done everything possible to weaken even this late, late deal.

Without pressure from ordinary people, world leaders would have gladly ignored this problem entirely. It’s pressure from people that will close the gap between what was signed today and the action we need.

This begins the next chapter. Please watch this space for the announcement of something big in the coming days!

If you are reading this, you’ve been part of the work that got us all to this point, and for that, we say thank you. 2015 was a historic year for us — because we worked together to build a more powerful and hopeful climate movement.

With gratitude, and as always, hope,

Signed: May Boeve (and the whole 350.org team)

www.FrackCheckWV.net

DivestUK says "gofossilfree.org" (7/11/15)

Letter from Laurie David, Founder of “The Stop Global Warming Virtual March”

Dear Fellow Marcher (July 30, 2015):

Ten years ago, I had an idea to build a large grassroots movement demanding solutions to global warming. With the help of friends and mentors including NRDC founder John Adams, former NRDC president Frances Bienecke, Senator John McCain, and Robert Kennedy Jr., a giant march on Washington to stop global warming was born, but on the internet instead of on the streets, combining our voices into one loud, clear cry for action.

The Stop Global Warming Virtual March has had three basic goals: to get Americans to admit that global warming is real; to acknowledge that we are causing it; and to demand meaningful solutions from our government and business community. We have been driven by a belief that the issue of climate change is not political, it is moral, and by a faith that large numbers of people acting together can change the world.

We have fulfilled our mission to help raise awareness, but it is clear there is more work to be done to put the country on a path towards a renewable energy future. Work that requires new tactics, and a new partner on the front lines of the next phase of this fight.

I am pleased to announce that StopGlobalWarming.org will be joining forces with 350.org, who will be taking the lead to continue our work.

The 350.org, co-founded by author Bill McKibben, is working to build a global movement to take on the climate crisis. Their online campaigns, grassroots organizing, and mass public actions are coordinated by a global network active in over 188 countries.

You might know 350.org from their campaign to stop the Keystone XL pipeline and their work to divest public institutions everywhere from fossil fuels. All of 350.org‘s work leverages people power to dismantle the influence and infrastructure of the fossil fuel industry, and to develop people-centric solutions to climate change. New tactics for a new day.

I am so grateful to everyone who has contributed to our efforts from the beginning, all of the friends, co-workers, featured marchers, and partner organizations, especially Tides. But most of all I am thankful for you.

We started StopGlobalWarming.org with the idea to use the power of the internet to build a coalition, but the true power of our movement is you, individuals who recognize that we are all contributors to global warming and we all need to be part of the solution.

Thank you. Keep marching, Laurie David, Founder of StopGlobalWarming.org

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Fossil Fuel Divestment: Building the Movement Around the World

>>> Update article from gofossilfree.org & 350.org, July 11, 2015

On Saturday 11th July, over 250 divestment activists came together in London for ‘Fossil Fuel Divestment: Building the Movement’, sharing their campaigning skills, inspiring stories from across the country, and the occasional cup of tea.

Really great images emerging from the big meeting in London today! You guys are leading the world!   — Bill McKibben, July 11, 2015

The event was organised by 350.org in partnership with The Guardian and hosted speakers from Carbon Tracker, BP or not BP, Divest London, ShareAction and Community Reinvest and many others.

If you had a company with a warehouse where 2/3 of the stuff inside couldn’t be sold, would you invest in it?   — Sam Gill, July 11, 2015

The day opened with an introduction to the divestment movement so far – featuring talks from activists involved in local government, university and faith campaigns, as well as The Guardian discussing their “keep it in the ground” campaign. In the afternoon, 15 workshops explored divestment in detail – from finance to creative action planning to media training. A colour-coded sticker system (don’t ask!) and plenty of refreshment breaks allowed campaigners to find each other and have the conversations vital to building our movement!

“I’ve seen the apartheid movement, this is much bigger” – Keith (member from the audience) — divestlondon, July 11, 2015

Missed the event? No fear! We have collated all of the resources from the day so they are publicly available.

See also:  www.FrackCheckWV.net

Divestment Time has Arrived in 2015

Divestment is Working. Now It’s Time To Escalate these Activities

From an Article by May Boeve, Common Dreams, February 12, 2015

It seems that every day now there’s another editorial, study, rant —even animations! — criticizing the fossil fuel divestment campaign. The pieces, usually written by lobbyists associated with fossil fuel companies, stodgy academics, or conservative politicians, usually cite the same arguments: divestment won’t make a financial difference, it’s a distraction from the “real work” of climate solutions, the world needs fossil fuels and we should be thanking Exxon for their generosity in providing them, etc.

The irony of all these articles, of course, is that their very publication is counterfactual. If divestment is such an ineffective campaign, then why is the fossil fuel industry spending so much time criticizing it? As Tom Zeller Jr. recently wrote in Forbes, “It seems clear the feisty divestment movement has reached a major new milestone in its short life: It has annoyed the fossil fuel juggernaut enough to warrant a full-fledged counter-campaign.”

When you hear someone shouting “those people don’t matter!” it’s usually a good sign that “those people” are beginning to make a serious impact. Which is exactly what the divestment campaign is doing. In 2012, the campaign got an early start on US campuses, with a focus on coal divestment. Now, there are active fossil fuel divestment campaigns at over 400 colleges and universities across the US, and hundreds more efforts underway targeting cities, states, foundations, and religious institutions worldwide. Medical associations are looking to divest. Pension funds are exploring their exposure to carbon risk. Individuals are pushing their banks to stop financing dirty energy. Everywhere you look, the campaign is spreading like wildfire.

This is especially exciting at the international level. This February 13th and 14th, 350.org (hosted) Global Divestment Day, a series of events around the world to highlight just how global the divestment fight has become. In the UK, campaigners are targeting some of the country’s most iconic universities, including Oxford and Cambridge, as well as putting pressure on the Church of England to follow their fellow Anglican, Desmond Tutu, and commit to divestment. Across Europe, activists are pushing some of the continent’s biggest banks to cut back on their investments in fossil fuels, as well as hosting rallies in cities like Berlin, Paris, and Amsterdam.

In Canada, divestment campaigners have put tar sands companies at the top of their list, making an explicit connection between the struggles of indigenous peoples against tar sands extraction and the responsibility of public institutions to stop financing the destruction. The focus at US campuses (is) asking their administrators, “Whose side are you on?”

The divestment campaign has also started to spread across the Global South, a region that has done little to contribute to the crisis of climate change, but whose richest banks, corporations, and institutions are beginning to play a more major role in financing the problem. Global Divestment Day (involves) events in Nigeria, Nepal, Peru, Vanuatu, and beyond, and beyond.

Meanwhile, there are few places where divestment has been making more of an impact than in Australia. Ever since campaigners convinced the Australian National University to divest from fossil fuels, the campaign has been front page news down under. The effort has been so effective that the mining industry, that is desperately trying to dig up some of the largest coal deposits on the planet in the Galilee Basin, have tried to declare divestment illegal. However, seems every week, we hear about another church, school, or foundation that is joining the fight.

Thanks to the amazing activism of all these people around the world, the divestment campaign is having exactly the impact that we hoped it would. We’ve helped push forward a dialogue about the risk the carbon bubble poses to our economy, convincing major institutions like the Bank of England to start evaluating their portfolios for carbon risk. Just this week, Norway’s Sovereign Wealth Fund, one of the largest pools of money in the world, announced it was divesting from coal and tar sands companies because of the carbon risk.

We’ve put major corporations on the defensive, prompting oil giants like Shell to say that they’re going to look at whether or not their business plans are compatible with the global goal of limiting warming to below 2°C (Hint: They’re not. Scientists have made it abundantly clear that you can’t be drilling in the Arctic if you’re at all serious about combating climate change).

Solving the climate crisis is a race against the clock. In the fight against climate chaos, there is such a thing as ‘too late.’ Over the last year, the divestment movement has hit its stride. Now, it’s time to pick up the pace.

<< The author, May Boeve is the Executive Director of 350.org. >>

See also: www.FrackCheckWV.net

WCC represents 590 million people

World Council of Churches Endorses Fossil Fuel Divestment

From an Article by Juan Cole, et al., Informed Comment, July 12, 2014

Geneva, Switzerland — The Central Committee of the World Council of Churches (WCC), a fellowship of over 300 churches which represent some 590 million people in 150 countries, endorsed fossil fuel divestment this week, agreeing to phase out its own holdings and encourage its members to do the same. The WCC Central Committee is made up of dozens of influential religious leaders from around the world, meaning the decision could resonate far and wide.

“The World Council of Churches reminds us that morality demands thinking as much about the future as about ourselves–and that there’s no threat to the future greater than the unchecked burning of fossil fuels,” said Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org, a global climate campaign that is supporting the divestment effort. “This is a remarkable moment for the 590 million Christians in its member denominations: a huge percentage of humanity says today ‘this far and no further.’”

“There was an explicit wish at the Finance Committee to include fossil fuels as one of the sectors where the WCC will not invest in, based on decisions to divest from fossil fuels taken by member churches in different parts of the world,” said Guillermo Kerber, who coordinates the WCC’s work on care for creation and climate justice. “The general ethical guidelines for investment already included the concern for a sustainable environment, for future generations and CO2 footprint. Adding fossil fuels to the list of sectors where the WCC does not invest in serves to strengthen the governing body’s commitment on climate change as expressed in various sessions of the Central Committee.”

The endorsement is a major victory for the fossil fuel divestment movement, which has seen a surge of momentum amongst religious institutions over the last few months. In recent weeks, the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly in the United States committed to divest, the University of Dayton in Ohio became the first Catholic institution to join the campaign, and the Church of Sweden have come out in favour of divestment.

“Scripture tells us that all of the world is God’s precious creation, and our place within it is to care for and respect the health of the whole,” said Serene Jones, the President of Union Theological Seminary in the US, which recently committed to divest its entire $108.4 million endowment from fossil fuels. “As a seminary dedicated to social justice, we have a critical call to live out our values in the world. Climate change poses a catastrophic threat, and as stewards of God’s creation we simply must act.”

At the national level, the United Church of Christ in the US and the Quakers in the UK have also endorsed divestment. Regionally, Lutheran, Quaker, and Episcopal denominations have also joined the effort in the US. In New Zealand and Australia, the Anglican Church has led the way, with many local dioceses and the entire Anglican Church of Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia committing to divestment.

One of the most powerful advocates for fossil fuel divestment has been Nobel Peace-Prize winner and former South African Anglican Archbishop, Desmond Tutu, who recently called for an “anti-apartheid style boycott of the fossil fuel industry”.

Tutu’s call to action has been echoed by top UN climate chief Christiana Figueres, who recently urged religious leaders to pull their investments out of fossil fuel companies, as well. Even US President Obama has given a nod to the effort, telling students, “You need to invest in what helps, and divest from what harms”.

“The World Council of Churches may be the most important commitment we’ve received yet,” said 350.org’s European Divestment Coordinator, Tim Ratcliffe. “It opens the doors for churchgoers around the world to encourage their institutions to live up to their values and divest from companies that are destroying the planet and our future.”

See also the Huffington Post on this topic.