Is your university profiting from climate change?
CBSN
While many universities are proud to talk about how they fight climate change, some also invest in and accept donations from the same oil companies that drive global warming. Experts and students are calling those schools hypocritical and are demanding change. "The oil and gas production in the Permian Basin is responsible in large part for the United States' remarkable energy independence, and it is a strategic national resource that would be tapped regardless of ownership. Six universities have fully exited their investments: Harvard University, Yale University, Stanford University, Princeton University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Michigan. One has partially exited: University of Pennsylvania. Three maintain their fossil fuel investments: Notre Dame University, University of Texas and Texas A&M University.
CBS News' "On the Dot" environmental series investigates the scope of the problem, starting with the University of Texas System, which collected $2.2 billion in oil and gas royalties last year. Through ownership of the University Lands, beginning with the Texas Constitution of 1876, royalties received by the University of Texas System and the Texas A&M System have positively impacted millions of people who have benefitted from historic investments in financial aid, faculty support, teaching, research, medical buildings and more."