Swedish climate change activist Greta Thunberg, Isabelle Axelsson and German Luisa Neubauer take part in a climate strike protest during the 50th World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland on Friday (Jan 24). - Reuters
LONDON: A 30 billion-pound ($39.3 billion) U.K. pension fund has threatened to fire managers that fail to curb their exposure to climate change and position for a low-carbon economy.
Brunel Pension Partnership also plans to vote against portfolio firms’ board members or divest from those that don’t make material steps to align their business with Paris Agreement benchmarks, it said in a statement.
Brunel, which manages investments for 10 local governments, said it wanted to use "its influence to challenge the asset manager industry.”
"Brunel will challenge their investment managers to demonstrate reduced exposure to climate risk and effective corporate engagement that puts companies and portfolios on a trajectory to align with a 2 degrees Celsius economy, ” said Brunel Chief Investment Officer Mark Mansley.
"Managers that fail to do so face the threat of having their mandates removed.”Brunel is adding its voice to a growing chorus of financial firms saying climate inaction has become a key investing risk.
In the past two months alone, the $7 trillion behemoth BlackRock Inc. said it will put climate issues at the center of its investing strategy, while Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said it aims to provide $750 billion for sustainable finance growth areas over the next decade.
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