Environmentalists notched what they consider a major win in the 2024 short legislative session. The COAL Act directs the state to drop about $1 billion in coal investments and to cease new investments in companies that mine and burn coal.

Proponents say the legislation aligns the state’s public pension investments with Oregon’s existing climate goals to reduce carbon emissions and transition to 100% clean energy.

Oregon isn’t the only state going this route. Fossil fuel divestment campaigns, which launched over a decade ago on college campuses, now focus on governments, pension funds, faith-based organizations and foundations, among others. To date, about $14 trillion has been divested from fossil fuels globally and commitments to divest topped $40 trillion across the world as of this summer.

Oregon’s coal-divestment legislation is based on a California law adopted in 2015 that led that state’s pension systems – the two largest public funds in the country – to divest from coal. A few other states and cities have also followed suit. Maine became the first state to pledge divesting from fossil fuels. New York City divested $3 billion of its pension funds three years ago and Los Angeles, New Orleans, San Francisco and Pittsburgh are also moving to divest their pension funds. Even Eugene in Oregon has pledged not to invest in fossil fuel companies.

But the movement to divest also has many critics. Some labor unions fear it could threaten hard-earned retirement money. And the issue has become highly politicized, with over a dozen Republican states passing or introducing model bills that ban them from doing business with financial groups that divest from fossil fuels.

Divestment is even controversial in California, where a bill to divest the state’s pension systems from all fossil fuels was shelved again during last year’s legislative session.

On the Beat Check podcast, the chief sponsor of Oregon’s coal divestment legislation, Rep. Khanh Pham, D-Portland, talked about why Oregon’s divestment from coal will help the state reach its climate goals, how it compares with other fossil fuel divestment campaigns and what individual investors can do to divest and align their own money with their environmental values.

Pham also spoke about what the state should invest in and how programs like Portland’s Clean Energy Fund – which she helped create – and the statewide Climate Protection Program’s Community Climate Investments can help low-income communities take part in the clean energy transition and better adapt to the changing climate.

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