British aid money is being used to fund fossil fuel projects in Africa and south east Asia, despite the UK government urging every country in the world to formalise plans to hit net zero greenhouse gas emissions.
An investigation by Greenpeace reveals the government’s development finance institution – CDC Group – which invests money in businesses in developing countries, has 16 active investments in oil and gas projects in Africa, and one in south east Asia.
Over $785m (£623m) has been invested by the organisation into 14 different intermediary investment funds which then pumped some of this money into oil and gas companies – CDC did not provide a full breakdown of how much money went to each company.
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But news of the investments in polluting fossil fuel firms comes as the government gears up to host the UN climate conference in spring 2021.
In February, at the formal launch of UK plans to host the COP26 climate, before it was delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic, Boris Johnson said: “We have to deal with out CO2 emissions and that is why the UK is calling for us to get to net zero as soon as possible – for every country to announce credible targets to get there.”
Climate change: Decade's defining issue in pictures
Show all 20
1/20 California
In this decade, humans have become ever more aware of climate change. Calls for leaders to act echo around the globe as the signs of a changing climate become ever more difficult to ignore
Getty
2/20 Athens, Greece
Fierce wildfires have flared up in numerous countries. The damage being caused is unprecedented: 103 people were killed in wildfires last year in California, one of the places best prepared, best equipped to fight such blazes in the world
AFP/Getty
3/20 Redding, California
Entire towns have been razed. The towns of Redding and Paradise in California were all but eliminated in the 2018 season
AP
4/20 Athens, Greece
While wildfires in Greece (pictured), Australia, Indonesia and many other countries have wrought chaos to infrastructure, economies and cost lives
AFP/Getty
5/20 Carlisle, England
In Britain, flooding has become commonplace. Extreme downpours in Carlisle in the winter of 2015 saw the previous record flood level being eclipsed by two feet
AFP/Getty
6/20 Hebden Bridge, England
Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire has flooded repeatedly in the past decade, with the worst coming on Christmas Day 2015. Toby Smith of Climate Visuals, an organisation focused on improving how climate change is depicted in the media, says: "Extreme weather and flooding, has and will become more frequent due to climate change. An increase in the severity and distribution of press images, reports and media coverage across the nation has localised the issue. It has raised our emotions, perception and personalised the effects and hazards of climate change."
Getty
7/20 Somerset, England
Out west in Somerset, floods in 2013 led to entire villages being cut off and isolated for weeks
Getty
8/20 Dumfries, Scotland
"In summer 2012, intense rain flooded over 8000 properties. In 2013, storms and coastal surges combined catastrophically with elevated sea levels whilst December 2015, was the wettest month ever recorded. Major flooding events continued through the decade with the UK government declaring flooding as one of the nation's major threats in 2017," says Mr Smith of Climate Visuals
Getty
9/20 London, England
Weather has been more extreme in Britain in recent years. The 'Beast from the East' which arrived in February 2018 brought extraordinarily cold temperatures and high snowfall. Central London (pictured), where the city bustle tends to mean that snow doesn't even settle, was covered in inches of snow for day
PA
10/20 London, England
Months after the cold snap, a heatwave struck Britain, rendering the normally plush green of England's parks in Summer a parched brown for weeks
AFP/Getty
11/20 New South Wales, Australia
Worsening droughts in many countries have been disastrous for crop yields and have threatened livestock. In Australia, where a brutal drought persisted for months last year, farmers have suffered from mental health problems because of the threat to their livelihood
Reuters
12/20 Tonle Sap, Cambodia
Even dedicated climate skeptic Jeremy Clarkson has come to recognise the threat of climate change after visiting the Tonle Sap lake system in Cambodia. Over a million people rely on the water of Tonle Sap for work and sustinence but, as Mr Clarkson witnessed, a drought has severley depleted the water level
Carlo Frem/Amazon
13/20 Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
In reaction to these harbingers of climate obliteration, some humans have taken measures to counter the impending disaster. Ethiopia recently planted a reported 350 million trees in a single day
AFP/Getty
14/20 Morocco
Morocco has undertaken the most ambitious solar power scheme in the world, recently completing a solar plant the size of San Francisco
AFP/Getty
15/20 London, England
Electric cars are taking off as a viable alternative to fossil fuel burning vehicles and major cities across the world are adding charging points to accomodate
AFP/Getty
16/20 Purmerend, The Netherlands
Cities around the world are embracing cycling too, as a clean (and healthy) mode of transport. The Netherlands continues to lead the way with bikes far outnumbering people
Jeroen Much/Andras Schuh
17/20 Xiamen, China
Cycling infrastructure is taking over cities the world over, in the hope of reducing society's dependency on polluting vehicles
Ma Weiwei
18/20 Chennai, India
Despite positive steps being taken, humans continue to have a wildly adverse effect on the climate. There have been numerous major oil spills this decade, the most notable being the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010
AFP/Getty
19/20 Amazon rainforest, Brazil
More recently, large swathes of the Amazon rainforest were set alight by people to clear land for agriculture
AFP/Getty
20/20 California
This decade may have seen horrors but it has led to an understanding that the next decade must see change if human life is to continue
Getty
1/20 California
In this decade, humans have become ever more aware of climate change. Calls for leaders to act echo around the globe as the signs of a changing climate become ever more difficult to ignore
Getty
2/20 Athens, Greece
Fierce wildfires have flared up in numerous countries. The damage being caused is unprecedented: 103 people were killed in wildfires last year in California, one of the places best prepared, best equipped to fight such blazes in the world
AFP/Getty
3/20 Redding, California
Entire towns have been razed. The towns of Redding and Paradise in California were all but eliminated in the 2018 season
AP
4/20 Athens, Greece
While wildfires in Greece (pictured), Australia, Indonesia and many other countries have wrought chaos to infrastructure, economies and cost lives
AFP/Getty
5/20 Carlisle, England
In Britain, flooding has become commonplace. Extreme downpours in Carlisle in the winter of 2015 saw the previous record flood level being eclipsed by two feet
AFP/Getty
6/20 Hebden Bridge, England
Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire has flooded repeatedly in the past decade, with the worst coming on Christmas Day 2015. Toby Smith of Climate Visuals, an organisation focused on improving how climate change is depicted in the media, says: "Extreme weather and flooding, has and will become more frequent due to climate change. An increase in the severity and distribution of press images, reports and media coverage across the nation has localised the issue. It has raised our emotions, perception and personalised the effects and hazards of climate change."
Getty
7/20 Somerset, England
Out west in Somerset, floods in 2013 led to entire villages being cut off and isolated for weeks
Getty
8/20 Dumfries, Scotland
"In summer 2012, intense rain flooded over 8000 properties. In 2013, storms and coastal surges combined catastrophically with elevated sea levels whilst December 2015, was the wettest month ever recorded. Major flooding events continued through the decade with the UK government declaring flooding as one of the nation's major threats in 2017," says Mr Smith of Climate Visuals
Getty
9/20 London, England
Weather has been more extreme in Britain in recent years. The 'Beast from the East' which arrived in February 2018 brought extraordinarily cold temperatures and high snowfall. Central London (pictured), where the city bustle tends to mean that snow doesn't even settle, was covered in inches of snow for day
PA
10/20 London, England
Months after the cold snap, a heatwave struck Britain, rendering the normally plush green of England's parks in Summer a parched brown for weeks
AFP/Getty
11/20 New South Wales, Australia
Worsening droughts in many countries have been disastrous for crop yields and have threatened livestock. In Australia, where a brutal drought persisted for months last year, farmers have suffered from mental health problems because of the threat to their livelihood
Reuters
12/20 Tonle Sap, Cambodia
Even dedicated climate skeptic Jeremy Clarkson has come to recognise the threat of climate change after visiting the Tonle Sap lake system in Cambodia. Over a million people rely on the water of Tonle Sap for work and sustinence but, as Mr Clarkson witnessed, a drought has severley depleted the water level
Carlo Frem/Amazon
13/20 Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
In reaction to these harbingers of climate obliteration, some humans have taken measures to counter the impending disaster. Ethiopia recently planted a reported 350 million trees in a single day
AFP/Getty
14/20 Morocco
Morocco has undertaken the most ambitious solar power scheme in the world, recently completing a solar plant the size of San Francisco
AFP/Getty
15/20 London, England
Electric cars are taking off as a viable alternative to fossil fuel burning vehicles and major cities across the world are adding charging points to accomodate
AFP/Getty
16/20 Purmerend, The Netherlands
Cities around the world are embracing cycling too, as a clean (and healthy) mode of transport. The Netherlands continues to lead the way with bikes far outnumbering people
Jeroen Much/Andras Schuh
17/20 Xiamen, China
Cycling infrastructure is taking over cities the world over, in the hope of reducing society's dependency on polluting vehicles
Ma Weiwei
18/20 Chennai, India
Despite positive steps being taken, humans continue to have a wildly adverse effect on the climate. There have been numerous major oil spills this decade, the most notable being the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010
AFP/Getty
19/20 Amazon rainforest, Brazil
More recently, large swathes of the Amazon rainforest were set alight by people to clear land for agriculture
AFP/Getty
20/20 California
This decade may have seen horrors but it has led to an understanding that the next decade must see change if human life is to continue
Getty
Rebecca Newsom, head of politics at Greenpeace UK, said: “The fact that UK aid money is helping wealthy Western companies to lock the developing world into oil and gas really beggars belief.
“These are often nations that are already on the frontlines of the climate emergency but have done the least to cause it.
“The government must put an immediate moratorium on all new fossil fuel investments overseas and phase out all existing investments by 2021, so the UK can genuinely lead by example as hosts of COP26.”
She added: “Rather than using millions of aid money to make the climate emergency worse, ministers should support a just transition away from fossil fuels and towards renewables that can supply affordable and reliable electricity to millions of people with no access to it.”
CDC was originally formed by the Labour government after the Second World War to assist British colonies in the development of agriculture, and its initials first stood for the Colonial Development Corporation. It was renamed the Commonwealth Development Corporation in 1963 and is now wholly owned by the Department for International Development. Since 2011 it has focused on the emerging markets of South Asia and Africa.
CDC’s investments in fossil fuels date back as far back as 2007, with the most recent investment, being in a company specialising in oil and gas services and transportation, including things like petrol stations in Uganda, which was made in March 2018.
The investigation also revealed where the intermediary investment funds the CDC has used to funnel money into these fossil fuel projects have their headquarters.
Greenpeace said of the 14 investment funds used for this purpose, 13 are domiciled in tax havens, including Luxembourg, Mauritius and the Cayman Islands. The one non-tax haven based investment fund is headquartered in London.
The investments CDC has made with UK aid money include supporting Texas-based Kosmos Energy, an oil exploration and production company which specialises in deepwater drilling. Its website says its “key assets” include offshore oil production in Ghana, Equatorial Guinea, and the US Gulf of Mexico, as well as offshore gas developments in Mauritania and Senegal.
CDC’s investment in Kosmos was in 2014.
It has also channelled funds into in two companies operating in Nigeria: Vertex Energy, a Texas-based company which refines oil to be used by the petrochemical industry, and Lagos-based firm Broron oil and gas which has an office in Houston.
Money is also invested in Africa Oil Corp, a firm based in British Columbia, Canada, which has oil licenses across Africa. CDC’s investment supports the company’s work in South Africa and was first made in 2014.
CDC also has an active investment in Sphere Petroleum QSC, a Qatari company which focuses on oil and gas exploration in west and north Africa and the Middle East. CDC’s investment in Sphere was made in 2007.
CDC told Greenpeace fossil fuel investments make up a small portion of its portfolio and such investments were only made after meeting stringent requirements.
A spokesperson said CDC had increased its investment in renewable energy since 2016 from 5 per cent of new investments to 25%per cent during the 2017-18 period.
The organisation said during the same period fossil fuels investments accounted for 4 per cent of new investments.
The Independent has contacted CDC Group and the Department for International Development for comment.
