洛克菲勒家族從化石燃料企業撤資

John D. Rockefeller built a vast fortune on oil. Now his heirs are abandoning fossil fuels.

約翰·D·洛克菲勒(John D. Rockefeller)憑藉石油積累了大量財富。現在，他的後代卻正在拋棄化石燃料。

The family whose legendary wealth flowed from Standard Oil is planning to announce on Monday that its $860 million philanthropic organization, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, is joining the divestment movement that began a couple years ago on college campuses.

洛克菲勒家族具有傳奇色彩的財富來自標準石油公司(Standard Oil)，該家族計劃於週一宣佈，旗下擁有8.6億美元（約合53億元人民幣）的慈善組織洛克菲勒兄弟基金會(Rockefeller Brothers Fund)將加入幾年前開始於大學校園的撤資運動。

The announcement, timed to precede Tuesday’s opening of the United Nations climate change summit meeting in New York City, is part of a broader and accelerating initiative.

聲明的發佈時間被定在週二聯合國氣候變化峯會在紐約開幕之前。這一舉動是一項規模更大而且正在加速的運動的一部分。

In recent years, 180 institutions — including philanthropies, religious organizations, pension funds and local governments — as well as hundreds of wealthy individual investors have pledged to sell assets tied to fossil fuel companies from their portfolios and to invest in cleaner alternatives. In all, the groups have pledged to divest assets worth more than $50 billion from portfolios, and the individuals more than $1 billion, according to Arabella Advisors, a firm that consults with philanthropists and investors to use their resources to achieve social goals.

近年來，有180家機構——包括慈善機構、宗教組織、養老基金和地方政府——以及數百名富裕的個人投資者承諾要出售他們持有的與化石燃料企業相關的資產，並對更加清潔的替代能源進行投資。艾瑞貝拉諮詢公司(Arabella Advisors)表示，這些機構承諾要撤資的金額共計超過500億美元，個人投資者則承諾撤走超過10億美元的投資。艾瑞貝拉爲慈善基金和投資者提供諮詢，以利用他們的資源來達成社會目標。

The people who are selling shares of energy stocks are well aware that their actions are unlikely to have an immediate impact on the companies, given their enormous market capitalizations and cash flow.

那些出售能源股票的人非常清楚，他們的行爲不可能對這些公司產生直接影響，因爲這些公司具有很高的市值和充裕的現金流。

Even so, some say they are taking action to align their assets with their environmental principles. Others want to shame companies that they believe are recklessly contributing to a warming planet. Still others say that the fight to limit climate change will lead to new regulations and disruptive new technologies that will make these companies an increasingly risky investment.

即便如此，有些公司和個人也表示，他們採取行動是爲了使公司的資產配置，與他們的環境原則保持一致。其他人則希望，在他們看來肆無忌憚地加劇全球變暖的那些企業，會因此感到羞愧。還有人則表示，這場遏制氣候變化的鬥爭，將促使官方制定一些新的監管規定，並催生一些打破常規的新科技，從而提高投資這些企業的風險。

Ultimately, the activist investors say, their actions, like those of the anti-apartheid divestment fights of the 1980s, could help spur international debate, while the shift of investment funds to energy alternatives could lead to solutions to the carbon puzzle.

這些激進投資者表示，與20世紀80年代的反種族隔離撤資鬥爭一樣，他們的行動最終將在國際社會上引起討論，而投資基金向替代能源的轉移，也有助於解決碳排放的難題。

“This is a threshold moment,” said Ellen Dorsey, executive director of the Wallace Global Fund, which has coordinated the effort to recruit foundations to the cause. “This movement has gone from a small activist band quickly into the mainstream.”

“這是一個跨越性的時刻，”華萊士全球基金(Wallace Global Fund)的首席執行官埃倫·多爾西(Ellen Dorsey)說。號召其他基金會加入這項事業的行動就是由這家基金協調開展的。“這項運動很快就從一個小規模運動變成了主流。”

Not everyone will divest completely or right away, Ms. Dorsey noted, and some are divesting just from specific sectors of the fossil fuel industry, such as coal.

多爾西指出，並非每個人都會完全或立即撤資，有些只是從化石燃料行業的特定領域撤資，比如煤炭。

“The key thing is that they are moving along toward a common destination,” she said.

她說，“關鍵在於，他們在朝一個共同的目的前進。”

Among the individual investors joining in the announcement on Monday is Mark Ruffalo, the actor. The news conference will include a videotaped message from Bishop Desmond Tutu, who said that because climate change has a disproportionate impact on the poor, it is “the human rights challenge of our time.”

週一發佈聲明的個人投資者中，包括演員馬克·魯法洛(Mark Ruffalo)。新聞發佈會上將播放一段大主教德斯蒙德·圖圖(Desmond Tutu)的視頻訊息。他表示，因爲氣候變化會給窮人帶來相當大的影響，所以這是“我們這個時代所面臨的人權挑戰”。

Just how transparent the various funds and institutions will be about the progress of their asset sales is uncertain.

各個基金和機構投資者出售資產的進度會有多大的透明度尚不得而知。

At the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, there is no equivocation but there is caution, said Stephen Heintz, its president. The fund has already eliminated investments involved in coal and tar sands entirely while increasing its investment in alternate energy sources.

洛克菲勒兄弟基金會總裁斯蒂芬·海因茲(Stephen Heintz)說，該基金會不是在含糊其辭，只是較爲謹慎。基金會增加對替代能源的投資的同時，已完全撤出了涉及煤炭和瀝青砂的投資。

Unwinding other investments in a complex portfolio from the broader realm of fossil fuels will take longer. “We’re moving soberly, but with real commitment,” he said.

在該基金會持有的龐雜投資組合中，將其他資金從化石燃料領域撤出，需要花更長時間。“我們的行動很慎重，但卻是誠心誠意的，”他說。

Steven Rockefeller, a son of Nelson A. Rockefeller and a trustee of the fund, said that he foresees financial problems ahead for companies that have stockpiled more reserves than they can burn without contributing significantly to climate damage. “We see this as having both a moral and economic dimension,” he said.

納爾遜·A·洛克菲勒(Nelson A. Rockefeller)之子、該基金的受託人之一史蒂文·洛克菲勒(Steven Rockefeller)表示，他認爲那些囤積的儲量超出消耗量，並且沒有給氣候事業做出貢獻的公司，將來會面臨財務困境。“我們認爲，這個問題既有道德影響，也有經濟影響，”他說。

Activism to divest from fossil fuel companies began on college campuses, but the record of success there has been mixed.

呼籲從化石燃料企業撤資的行動始於大學校園，但那裏的收穫情況卻成敗參半。

The university with the biggest endowment, Harvard, has declined to divest, despite pressure from many students and outside organizations.

儘管受到了許多學生和外部組織的壓力，但獲得捐款最多的哈佛大學(Harvard)卻拒絕撤資。

Drew Gilpin Faust, Harvard’s president, has issued statements that she and her colleagues do not believe that divestment is “warranted or wise,” and argued that the school’s $32.7 billion endowment “is a resource, not an instrument to impel social or political change.”

哈佛大學校長德魯·吉爾平·福斯特(Drew Gilpin Faust)發表聲明稱，自己和同事不認爲撤資是“必要或明智的”，並稱哈佛的327億美元捐款“是一筆資源，而不是用來推動社會或政治變革的工具”。

Stanford recently announced it would divest its holdings in the coal industry; Yale University’s investment office asked its money managers to examine how its investments affect climate change and to look into avoiding companies that do not take sensible “steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.” The announcement did not satisfy students pressing for divestment.

斯坦福大學(Stanford)前不久宣佈將放棄煤炭行業的股份；耶魯大學(Yale University)的投資辦公室要求自己的基金管理人員，研究其投資對氣候變化的影響情況，並考慮不要對那些採取逃避態度、沒有實施合理的“溫室氣體減排舉措”的公司進行投資。該聲明未能讓迫切要求撤資的學生滿意。

Pitzer College, however, is one of a number of schools that have promised more extensive efforts to remove fossil fuels from their endowments. Donald P. Gould, a trustee and chair of the Pitzer investment committee and president of Gould Asset Management, said that everyone involved in the decision knew that the direct and immediate effect on the companies would be minimal.

然而，有許多院校已經承諾會做出更廣泛的努力，從其捐贈基金中剔除化石燃料企業，匹澤學院(Pitzer College)就是其中之一。匹澤學院投資委員會主席兼受託人、古爾德資產管理(Gould Asset Management)總裁唐納德·P·古爾德(Donald P. Gould)表示，所有參與決策的人都知道，相關企業立即受到的直接影響是非常小的。

“I don’t think that anyone who favors divestment is arguing that the institutions’ sale of the fossil fuel company stock is going to have much impact, if any, on either the stocks or the companies themselves,” he said, since the market capitalizations of the companies is immense.

“我認爲，贊成撤資的人不會認爲這些機構出售化石燃料公司股票的作法，會對股價或是公司本身造成很大影響。可能毫無影響，”他說，因爲這些公司市值巨大。

Even if the movement were to depress share prices, the energy companies, which make enormous profits from their products, do not need to go to capital markets to raise money, he noted. But in the long term, he said, “divestment seeks to work indirectly on these companies by changing the conversation about the climate.”

他指出，即使這一運動會壓低股價，從產品中獲取鉅額利潤的相關能源公司，也不需要去資本市場籌集資金。但他表示，從長遠看，“撤資行動的目的是，希望通過影響關於氣候的討論，來間接地影響這些公司。”