Environment Forum
Global environmental challenges
from Global Investing:
State funds and environmental investing
An Australian local government superannuation fund has become the latest state-owned fund to invest in environmental funds.
Local Government Super (LGS), which manages around A$6 billion in assets for 100,000 local government employees in New South Wales, has invested A$50 million ($45.96 million) into a portfolio which invests in small cap environmental technology stocks, run by London-based Impax Asset Management.
The portfolio will follow an investment strategy followed by one of Impax's fund, which returned 47.71 percent in the last five years, versus 20.10 percent for the benchmark MSCI World Index.
A greater involvement by state-owned funds would give a boost to the Socially Responsible Investing industry, which has so far failed to give convincing returns (obviously Impax's fund above looks like an exception).
Crustaceans rule!
Ever wondered what kinds of wildlife dominate the world’s seas and oceans? Now there’s an answer, at least in terms of the number of species in different categories. It’s not fish. It’s not mammals. It’s crustaceans!
A mammoth Census of Marine Life has revealed that nearly one-fifth, or 19 percent, of all the marine species known to humans are crustaceans — crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill, barnacles and others far too numerous to mention here. The census didn’t count the actual numbers of animals beneath the waves — that would have been impossible — but it did count up the number of species in 25 marine areas. The aim is to set down a biodiversity baseline for future use.
Is the U.S. West going the way of parched Australia?
The drought-induced infernos which ravaged parts of Australia earlier this year may be a harbinger of the water challenges coming to the American West.
”Think of that (Australia) as California’s future,” water researcher Heather Cooley of California’s Pacific Institute told my colleague Peter Henderson. You can see his report, part one of our series on water scarcity in the U.S. West, here.
