So far, 20 Nobel Prize winners have called on the Nobel Foundation to stop investing in coal, oil and gas companies, as fossil fuels are the main driver of climate change. An international petition with the same demands has now reached over 115,000 signatures and the pressure is increasing on the Nobel Foundation and its CEO Lars Heikensten.
”We like the Nobel Prize and the fact that it celebrates the greatest progress of humanity, but we do not like the fact that it funds climate change,” says Eva Lenke from the Divest Nobel campaign.
”We are addressing the Nobel Foundation because a positive decision from such an influential actor would be heard all over the world. It’s time to leave the fossil era behind.”
Over 900 institutions have moved their money from the fossil industry; among them eminent academies and foundations such as the Phipps Conservatory, Stanford and Yale. The Divest Nobel campaign was launched in Sweden in 2016 with the aim of getting the Nobel Foundation to join these ranks by switching to sustainable investments.
In May this year, the Nobel Foundation adopted a new investment policy promising to exclude coal. It is a positive first step, but without any deadline and a concrete plan that also covers oil and gas, the Nobel Prize can not be decoupled from climate destruction.
”Many people around the world are waiting for the Nobel Foundation to act,” says Cajsa Unnbom from the Divest Nobel campaign. “As a patron of science who wants to support work for the greatest benefit to mankind, they have a responsibility to do more.”
On Saturday, September 29, at 12 PM, a cleaning team from Divest Nobel will appear outside the Nobel Museum in Stockholm and offer their help with cleaning the Nobel Prize from dirty investments.
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Press contact: Eva Lenke, 070-219 39 86, contact@divestnobel.org
The petition can be found here: https://actions.sumofus.org/a/nobel-foundation-fossil-fuels-divestment-now
Open letter from Nobel Laureates: https://gofossilfree.org/europe/letter-from-nobel-prize-winners-to-nobel-foundation/