Page 17 - EurOil Week 34 2021

EurOil ENERGY TRANSITION EurOil

Norway’s wealth fund to include climate

risks in investment mandate

NORWAY NORWAY’S $1.4 trillion sovereign wealth former hedge fund manager, became the fund’s
fund, accumulated through decades of oil and CEO last year.
The fund will hang gas revenues, should do more to get the com- While the wealth fund should maintain a
on to its oil and gas panies it invests in to bring their greenhouse diversified portfolio, it should also withdraw
investments, but is gas (GHG) emissions to net zero by 2050, a from companies that do not address their emis-
expected to put more government-appointed commission said on sions, the commission said.
scrutiny on companies August 20. The fund has also taken aim at oil “If there is an unacceptable risk that a com-
in its portfolio to firms in particular, warning that some in its pany is linked to serious environmental damage
improve their climate portfolio are not doing enough to address their or to an unacceptable degree causes greenhouse
credentials. impact on the climate. gas emissions, then the company should be
In a statement, the commission called for excluded from the fund’s investments, or put
climate risk to be made part of the mandate of under a watch list,” Skancke said.
the fund, which is run by Norway’s central bank. In an interview with Bloomberg last week, the
But while other European financiers have scaled fund’s chief corporate governance offier, Carine
back investments in hydrocarbons, the com- Smith Ihenacho, warned that there were “abso-
mission said the fund should continue funding lutely” some oil companies in its portfolio which
oil and gas while pushing those companies to were falling short.
decarbonise. “These are companies we monitor very, very
“The best way to decarbonise the fund is to closely with a view to the climate and emissions,”
decarbonise the companies the fund invests she said.
in,” the commission’s head, Martin Skancke, Despite its wealth fund applying more cli-
explained. mate scrutiny to its investments, Norway’s cen-
The Government Pension Fund Global was tre-right government has been clear that it sees
created 30 years ago, and now controls more oil and gas remaining a bedrock of the country’s
than 1.5% of globally listed stocks and sprawling economy for decades to come. In a strategy
portfolios of bonds and real estate. While there released in June, the government said it expected
are limits on how much governments can with- Norway to continue producing oil and gas until
draw, the fund has helped steer Norway through 2050 and beyond, while continuing to hold reg-
times of economic hardship, particularly during ular oil and gas licensing rounds within the time
downturns in the oil market. Nicolai Tangen, a frame. ™

Week 34 25•August•2021 www. NEWSBASE .com P17