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Cambridge university has temporarily stopped accepting donations from fossil fuel companies in response to mounting pressure after an independent report warned that due diligence failings had created a “high reputational risk”.
A moratorium on new funding from oil and gas companies had been formally adopted, lasting until the process for accepting donations is reviewed, the university confirmed to the Financial Times.
“Accepting funding from fossil fuel companies validates the industry at a time when it is threatening the future viability of life on earth, including by developing new oil and gas infrastructure,” said Jason Scott-Warren, a Cambridge professor of early modern literature who backed the moratorium.
The student group Cambridge Climate Justice said the proposal, which was accepted on Friday, marked the first time a university in the UK had decided to halt research partnerships with the fossil fuel industry.
Shell said its work with academic partners “aims to accelerate the energy transition by bringing together the brightest minds . . . as well as the commercial ability to scale-up and implement new solutions fast enough to make a difference”. BP did not respond to a request for comment.
Shell and BP’s ties to Cambridge have grown in recent years against a backdrop of rising concern over the increasing impact of climate change and the wider influence of energy companies on academic research.
The moratorium was proposed by academics at Cambridge this month and stopped short of recommending an indefinite ban on donations.
The decision follows a report in July last year, led by UN climate champion Nigel Topping, which recommended that Cambridge disengage from oil and gas producers in favour of renewable energy companies.
The report found the fossil fuel sector made up 0.4 per cent of the university’s research and philanthropy funding in the six years up to 2022. It also noted that Cambridge’s due diligence process had underestimated the reputational threat of ties to these companies.
“Given the high reputational risk and the relatively small amounts of funding involved, this process should be significantly tightened up to ensure much clearer decision logic and transparent alignment with the university’s stated policy objectives,” the report concluded.
British oil and gas giants Shell and BP have jointly given at least £19.7mn to the university in philanthropic and research funding between 2016 and 2023, according to FT analysis of university data, which did not list any other donors in the energy sector.
Both companies have backed research at Cambridge into technologies designed to bolster the transition to cleaner energy. These include carbon capture and storage, a technology that has not yet been proven at scale and some scientists have said distracts from the need to cut emissions.
BP said last year it had not entered into contracts for research at Cambridge into oil and gas areas for at least five years. Shell said its investment into the university since 2021 had been focused on the energy transition.
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