Welcome!

Welcome to Fossil Free California.

We are a movement dedicated to a prosperous future for California. Our state can thrive without the dirty power of fossil fuels—oil, gas, and coal. With your help, Fossil Free California will publicize the dangerous policies of fossil fuel companies and begin to reduce their power to destroy the climate.

Our vision is to make California a fossil free zone, where vehicles, power plants, and industries run on renewable energy—and where clean technologies like solar, wind, and geothermal are readily available and affordable.

How can we achieve this vision? We can divest from fossil fuel companies. That means selling the stocks and bonds we have, un-investing in climate destruction. These old-energy companies are a risky business for us as individual investors, but they are especially risky for large investors like the public funds that hold our retirement money.

Divest CalSTRS and CalPERS.

So Fossil Free California is campaigning to change the investment practices of the two largest state pension funds in the country: CalSTRS, the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, and CalPERS, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System. We are working to convince both funds to divest, to dump their dangerous holdings in oil, gas, and coal companies. If you are a member of CalSTRS or CalPERS, either active or retired—or if you are simply a concerned California resident—please sign the petition and join us today.

Divestment is the right thing to do morally. As the burning of fossil fuels begins to heat the planet beyond the limits of human survival, we should not leave our money invested in companies that cause that destruction. In the words of Bill McKibben, cofounder of 350.org: “If it’s wrong to wreck the climate, then it’s wrong to profit from that wreckage.”

Divestment is also the smart thing to do financially, since our pensions and institutional funds will be safer without fossil fuel money. Oil, coal, and gas reserves are now overvalued. If we continue to invest in these companies, we will see our retirement money wither away.

Fossil Free California is spreading the word that divestment is in everyone’s best interest, and that it’s time for institutional boards and governing bodies throughout the state to get rid of their fossil fuel investments. Besides CalPERS and CalSTRS, we are working to implement divestment in:

• other public pension funds
• universities and colleges, public and private
• cities, counties, and other government entities
• faith groups

We need your help. Join us to make California a Fossil Free state!