Can’t buy me love

News in Brief by Benard L Agona

Good news. On 22 September, an East London pension fund with assets of £735m became the first local government pension scheme in Britain to decide to exclude all fossil fuels from its investment strategy (over the next five years).

The chair of the Waltham Forest pension fund committee, councillor Simon Miller said: ‘Not only does this mean the fund will not be invested in stranded assets but [it] will be actively investing in cleaner, greener investments to the benefit of our community, borough and environment.’

Bad news. We can’t afford to burn even the oil, gas or coal in the wells and mines we’re already exploiting, according to the latest data.

Leading climate activist Bill McKibben writes in the New Republic (22 September) that mines and wells in operation worldwide contain 942 gigatons worth of CO2, over twice as much carbon as we can release if we want to stay below a 1.5 degree Celsius rise in temperatures.