Divestment of fossil-fuel holdings by University of Denver would be unwise.
While it is understandable that some University of Denver students might wish to see their institution shed its fossil-fuel holdings, such a move would be hardly realistic, and we hope the trustees maintain their independence concerning their endowment’s portfolio.
There is a teachable moment here, though in truth this kind of debate is getting stale.
As The Denver Post’s Jennifer Brown reported this week, DU students, led by New York-based 350.org, have convinced the university to study their request to divest holdings in coal, natural gas and oil companies. The university has assembled a task force. The task force has had seven meetings. Task force members say they feel a moral obligation to study the request, and with urgency.
Winning that kind of traction is what the activists at 350.org get paid to do by their ideological donors, and they’ve enjoyed even greater success at some universities. In Colorado, for example, Naropa University in Boulder has promised to take such steps.
Naropa is in good company. The likes of Yale and Stanford universities have taken up similar pledges. But so far no other Colorado university has done so. Nor has Harvard, a fact that we hope DU trustees keep in mind as they face this challenge.
Climate change is frightening and worth combating, of course. We’ve long been in favor of taking reasonable steps toward a greater reliance on energy sources — like wind and solar — that don’t contribute to a warmer planet.
But as noted by DU’s vice chancellor for legal affairs, Paul Chan, the mission of the university is to provide a good education for its students. Presumably, many of them will end up working in fossil-fuel industries or in careers to augment or benefit from them.
One DU student involved in the 350.org effort said at a recent forum that the students’ goal isn’t to stigmatize fellow students who go on to fossil-fuel careers, but to persuade energy companies to switch to green energy.
That sounds really great, but it’s completely unrealistic to think that our state, our nation or other others can immediately stop depending on the plentiful fossil fuels available to provide the power we need to live the lives to which we are accustomed. It would be cruel to poor and hardworking people in our country and impoverished nations beyond our borders to do so.
Here in Colorado, fossil-fuel development plays an important role as a corporate citizen that provides good jobs for many workers while also providing the important bridge fuel that is natural gas: a fuel that inexpensively keeps the lights on while producing far less pollution than coal, for example.
Chan adds that taking 350.org’s marching orders would harm DU’s ability to serve its students, and constrain its ability to invest in companies “that are also working on meaningful change.”
As Brown notes in her report, the oil and gas industry spent $90 billion in recent years on reducing greenhouse emissions
Further, it’s also not even clear that such a divestment would have any impact whatsoever on climate change.
We hope trustees defend their investment practices while finding ways to also invest in green energy companies that make it more feasible to wean ourselves from fuels that harm the planet.