Revealed: Gates Foundation's $1.4bn in fossil fuel investments

(guardian-, 19 Mar 2015) Analysis of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s most recent tax filing reveals huge investments in the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies.

The charity run by Bill and Melinda Gates, who say the threat of climate change is so serious that immediate action is needed, held at least $1.4bn (£1bn) of investments in the world’s biggest fossil fuel companies, according to a Guardian analysis of the charity’s most recent tax filing in 2013 .

The companies include BP, responsible for the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, Anadarko Petroleum, which was recently forced to pay a $5bn environmental clean-up charge and Brazilian mining company Vale, voted the corporation with most “contempt for the environment and human rights” in the world clocking over 25,000 votes in the Public Eye annual awards.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Asset Trust is the world’s largest charitable foundation, with an endowment of over $43bn, and has already given out $33bn in grants to health programmes around the world, including one that helped rid India of polio in 2014.

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guardian-, 19 Mar 2015: Revealed: Gates Foundation's $1.4bn in fossil fuel investments