Counting the impact of your green investing

Study says investing can offset up to a third of our carbon footprints

This column is for Callaway Climate Insights subscribers only, but it’s OK to share once in a while. Was it shared with you? Please subscribe.

(Mark Hulbert, an author and longtime investment columnist, is the founder of the Hulbert Financial Digest; his Hulbert Ratings audits investment newsletter returns.)

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (Callaway Climate Insights) — Ready for this week’s green investing pop quiz? What percentage of your carbon footprint would you offset by investing $12,000 in a green energy fund for the next 10 years?

It’s not easy to even estimate an answer, of course, since you have to make complex assumptions, such as how your $12,000 investment will affect the cost of capital for each of the companies whose stocks the fund owns. But if you’re like the average of more than two thousand European retail investors who recently were asked this question, you believe your investment will offset 16.7% — one sixth — of your annual carbon footprint.

This survey was part of an academic study that just began circulating in academic circles. Titled “Beliefs About the Climate Impact of Green Investing,” the study was conducted by Florian Heeb of the Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE in Frankfurt, Germany, and Julian Kölbel and Camilla Weder of the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. Note that the investment amount used in the researchers’ survey was €10,000, which is approximately equal to $12,000.