The fossil fuel divestment movement is spreading across college campuses. Most recently, students at the University of Washington staged a sit-in to urge the university administration to divest from its fossil fuel holdings. Last year, Harvard University – which has the largest fossil fuel endowment in the country – announced plans to divest from the industry after its student body protested.
Divesting from fossil fuels sounds like a great idea for a young, climate-conscious activist to get behind. That is until you get into the details and consequences.
The fossil field divestment movement, and those who support it, have no real plan for the aggressive clean energy transition they propose. Not only do fossil fuels still make up 60% of American energy, but a new report from the American Petroleum Institute shows that the industry supports nearly 11 million jobs and contributes more than 7% of the U.S. GDP.
50 BLUE STATE MAYORS CALL FOR OFFSHORE WIND MORATORIUM AMID WHALE, DOLPHIN DEATHS
CLICK HERE TO GET THE OPINION NEWSLETTER
More surprisingly, the second-largest oil and gas economy in the country is no other than California. The oil and gas industry generates $217.1 billion for the state’s economy, which would be hard to guess from the renewables-over-all attitude that California projects. This is just further proof that divesting from fossil fuels is a huge, unrealistic mistake – even for bright blue states.
Perhaps even more importantly, shunning this industry here in the United States wouldn’t result in lower global greenhouse gas emissions.
The American oil and gas industry produces energy with some of the highest environmental standards and close to the least carbon intensity in the world. If our major institutions divest from fossil fuels and handicap the industry, fossil fuels won’t go away. Other countries will simply produce fossil fuel energy in a dirtier way.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
This is not to say that clean energy – or an energy transition as a concept – is not important. We should be prioritizing clean energy sources, but we should be doing so with a realistic mindset. We need an all-of-the-above approach that balances reliability, affordability, abundance, and yes – cleanliness.