If I’m doing my job as ANUSA Environment Officer properly, you should have seen posters, flyers, or social media promoting the ANU Environment Collective’s ‘ANU ZERO’ campaign calling for divestment from fossil fuel companies. But maybe you haven’t heard exactly what the campaign is asking the ANU to do, or why it is necessary. In this article, I want to explain how our campaign is asking for sensible, achievable action from the university, and how student pressure can help bring it about. I also want to illustrate the broader political context behind the divestment movement and its past successes. 

The end goal of this campaign is to have the ANU commit to divesting from all companies that substantially produce fossil fuels. This goal has historically been rubbished by ANU leaders like Brian Schmidt, who have contended that specific divestment is possible but divestment from the entire fossil fuel sector, which makes up a substantial portion of the Australian economy, is not fiscally sound. As an activist, I would rather not waste my time pursuing impossible goals, so I put in the research to make sure that the ANU ZERO campaign’s demands are, in fact, feasible. 

Conducting that research into each of the 39 Australian public universities and their investment policies and commitments, I found results that shocked me. I expected one or two universities to have committed to divesting from fossil fuel corporations, but it turns out at least ten universities have made commitments to divest from either the vast majority or all of them. Two of these ten — Adelaide University and the University of Queensland — are part of the wealthy and prestigious ‘Group of Eight’ along with the ANU. Another three universities, including two more in the Go8, have committed to not invest in companies that primarily produce fossil fuels, a stance which the ANU also does not take.

The ANU brags about its investment policies being ‘sector-leading’, but in fact, the ANU lags behind one-third of all Australian universities and one-half of the Go8. The universities ahead of us have sensibly recognised that investments in fossil fuel companies are both unethical and financially risky in a world where public opinion is turning against them and reserves are running out. But at least the ANU has its own policies setting carbon targets for its investment portfolio more broadly — which would be worth something if they were followed.

Bad news: the ANU isn’t even necessarily following its own current policies, according to their own most recent Socially Responsible Investments Report. In the report, the ANU discloses that 3.28 percent of their entire Long Term Investment Pool, totalling some $43 million, has been invested in projects that violate their own carbon rules. In addition, the ANU discloses that its domestic investments, if replicated across the entire economy, would be ‘consistent with’ a 2.5 degree rise in global temperatures, a catastrophic outcome for life on this planet. That means, according to the ANU’s own report, that the ANU’s investments are ‘misaligned’ with the goals of the Paris Agreement to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees. 

Through the Freedom of Information process, we were also able to find that the ANU remains heavily invested in major fossil fuel companies BHP and Woodside Energy, both among Australia’s largest polluters. More than $32 million alone was invested in BHP and more than $6 million was invested in Woodside, as of June 2024. As well as mining many other minerals, BHP owns the massive Mount Albert thermal coal mine — which burns coal for power generation — as well as 50 percent of four gigantic metallurgical coal mines. Woodside, meanwhile, is mostly focused on fossil fuel extraction, owning the largest oil and gas reserves of any company in Australia, with a history of skirting environmental laws and failing to reduce emissions. Woodside’s record on emissions is so dodgy that its own shareholders voted by a large margin to reject Woodside’s climate plans.

One reason gigantic and socially harmful businesses like these stay profitable and in business is that they spend vast sums buying politicians and public opinion. The point of divestment campaigns is not just about the direct sums of money going towards harmful industries, although the ANU’s investments in fossil fuels are outrageous. By removing funding, we can erode the social license of fossil fuels in each sector of society. We want to toxify the reputation of fossil fuels to the extent that a politician taking fossil fuel money becomes as scandalous as it would be for a politician to affiliate himself with bikies or mobsters. Destroying the reputation of the fossil fuel industry does harm its ability to make profits, which is why these corporations spend absurd sums on media and public relations.

Our ANU Environment Collective alone, essential though it is, cannot achieve anything quite so significant as destroying the reputation of these companies. But we can help rebuild the climate movement among young people. The climate movement is in dire straits in this country, with the important exception of excellent turnout for Rising Tide events every year. Don’t just take my word for it — scrolling through the ACT Conservation Council’s outdated list of members is like scrolling through the movement’s graveyard, with very few of the climate organisations listed having functioned in years. 

Our little organisation is one of the very few exceptions, and one of my most important tasks is to let people know that there is still a place where climate-conscious students can congregate on campus. The previous successes of the Collective have very directly inspired climate movements nationwide. For example, when the Collective successfully campaigned for the ANU to divest from some fossil fuel interests, it inspired La Trobe students to launch their own campaign, which led to their university becoming the first in Australia to comprehensively divest from fossil fuels. It’s up to us to convince the ANU to join them and many other universities across Australia in making at least some responsible investment choices.

You can sign the petition supporting the ANU ZERO campaign here. We meet every second Tuesday, on odd weeks of semester, at 5:30pm in the ANUSA Boardroom! 

Sarah Strange is the elected Environment Officer of ANUSA, the ANU student union. She is also a member of the ACT Greens and a National Conference Delegate with the Greens.