Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), said it is worrying to see ESG increasingly portrayed as political and that many company boards are failing to plan for the energy transition in its responsible investment report 2022. The report revealed that last year NBIM voted against the re-election of 61 directors at 18 companies due to failures in adequately managing climate risk. The companies, from Asia and the US, were all high emitters that did not report in accordance with the TCFD recommendations and had not otherwise set any emission reduction targets, according to NBIM. At the end of 2022, 6% of its equity portfolio was invested in companies generating revenue from climate solutions, based on MSCI’s definition, and 13% of its equity and bond investments were companies included in the FTSE Environmental Opportunities Index. Green bonds in the fixed-income portfolio amounted to 61.7 billion kroner, based on the definition for the MSCI Bloomberg Green Bond Index.
