Norway’s wealth fund falls short on climate ambitions, NGO says

By Gwladys Fouche

OSLO (Reuters) – The world’s largest sovereign wealth fund is falling short on its own climate expectations by failing to vote in support of key shareholder resolutions during this year’s AGM season, a non-governmental organisation said on Monday.

The $1.8 trillion fund pools the Nordic state’s revenue from oil and gas production. Since 2022 it aims for the 9,000 companies it invests in to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, in line with the Paris Agreement.

As part of its strategy, the fund’s management, Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), sets expectations to corporate boards on climate change and votes at annual general meetings on the issue.

It says it engages with companies in multiple ways, including via voting on shareholder proposals, and in severe cases can divest from companies if they fail to respond.

The fund is failing short, however, on that ambition, according to a new report by Norwegian NGO Framtiden i vaare hender (Future in our Hands) reviewed by Reuters ahead of its release on Monday.

The report analysed the fund’s voting record on 21 climate resolutions at 17 companies during this year’s annual general meetings’ season, including at Shell, BP and TotalEnergies.

It found the fund voted against 17 out of 21 climate resolutions deemed important to support by three climate lobby groups, instead aligning with recommendation from the management of the companies’ concerned. The fund supported the remaining four.

Lucy Brooks, an advisor on sustainable finance at the NGO, said the fund had been fairly consistent in voting against company management on some issues, such as excessive executive pay, but not when it comes to climate change.

They are far less consistent when it comes to voting on the limited number of climate resolutions put forward at the most critical companies that can influence the energy transition away from fossil fuels,” she told Reuters.

They do not ensure that their votes align with the expectations laid out in their own climate action plan.

NBIM said it engaged with top emitters via company meetings and via voting at AGMs and that it often considered these tools in combination.

When deciding whether to back a shareholder proposal, NBIM said it analyses three factors: materiality, prescriptiveness and its scope.

This detailed analysis often results in us withholding support for proposals that at first glance raise important topics and contain language that is aligned with our own expectations,” Eivind Fliflet, head of the environmental team in NBIM’s active ownership department, told Reuters.

“We recognise that there are different views on what it means for individual companies in various sectors to be aligned with the goals of the Paris Agreement and follow developments and standards in this area closely.”

In the first half of 2024, NBIM supported 31% of shareholder proposals on sustainability topics it voted at, roughly the same as in 2023, it said.

(Reporting by Gwladys Fouche in Oslo; editing by David Evans)