Today, California’s message to the Trump administration is simple: Not here, not now. We will not let the federal government pillage public lands and destroy our treasured coast.
— Governor Jerry Brown, September 8, 2018
The Trump Administration has gone all in with global warming denial and fossil fuels — pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement, increasing subsidies to the coal industry, and removing regulations governing fossil fuel drilling/mining on public lands and offshore waters. In doing so, we believe that the administration grossly misallocates the all-in costs of fossil fuel development and combustion, allowing the fossil fuel industry to collect most of the revenue generated by its activity while sticking society with significant costs in the form of local environmental degradation and global warming.
As long-term global investors, we care that the administration's fossil fuel policies destroy the value of our investments, and mankind's current and future quality of life. We walk the talk by donating 1% of our revenue to non-profit organizations attacking the challenge of global warming via the 1% for the Planet organization, and by voicing our support to positive legislative actions when possible. Last month we did just that by supporting two California state bills (SB 834 and AB 1775) that aim to block new federal offshore oil drilling along California's coast. We are pleased to learn that today California Governor Jerry Brown signed both bills. You can read Governor Brown's full statement here.
On a related note, yesterday Governor Brown, the California Department of Conservation, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the California Department of Water Resources, the California Department of Parks and Recreation, the California Air Resources Board, and the State Water Resources Control Board submitted their objections to the Bureau of Land Management's (BLM) proposal to open 1.6 million acres of California public lands and mineral estates in six counties to oil and gas lease sales. The BLM's proposal hits close to home as it includes a 40 acre parcel of my son's high school campus, and an adjacent 80 acre preserve owned by a land conservancy non-profit, for which the BLM claims it owns mineral rights.