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Ouch: Environmental investors lost 22% in a year when Energy investors made 54% gains

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By Jo Nova

Hands up who wants to lose money?

These numbers that Rupert Darwall has put together in  Real Clear Energy are extraordinary:

2022: The Year ESG Fell to Earth

The year 2022 brings an end to an era of illusions: … [it] brought environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing down to earth with a thump—for the year to date, BlackRock’s ESG Screened S&P 500 ETF lost 22.2% of its value, and the S&P 500 Energy Sector Index rose 54.0%.

Ponder how savagely poignant these losses are for the ESG doe-eyed investors. In their wildest wet dreams ten years ago they would have crawled over shards of glass naked to get coal prices up to $400USD a ton. In a year when coal and gas were obscenely expensive, the glorious cheap efficiency of solar and wind power could shine like never before.

Instead demand for fashionable random green electrons vanished. There was never a need for “random” power, and the energy crisis just peeled back the onion to reveal the true demand. Wind and solar power were just the fashion accessories that no one had to have. Coal, oil and gas were essential.

Not only did demand fall, but the supply fell too. As costs rose, factories struggled to make wind turbines, solar panels, and batteries. It turned out that random power generators couldn’t be made with random power.

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Spread the word. Ask your friends — are their retirement funds invested in ESG? You will be doing them a favour.

The real transition of the last 700 years was *to* fossil fuels, and it’s still happening.

h/t GWPF, NetZeroWatch