Wednesday, 10 Apr 2002

AUSTIN, Texas

A sunny day! I ride my bike to work, enjoying the chance to travel carbon-free. It’s good to have a relaxing morning commute, because once I get into the office, another conference call marathon gets underway.

It starts with thinking about the next-to-final draft of the Exxon report. The most challenging — and interesting — part of this work is putting the issue of global warming into terms that investors can understand. One way to do that is to talk about it terms of the pocketbook, so the report looks at how ExxonMobil is putting itself — and thus investors’ money — at risk due to its position on global warming.

We’re thinking about releasing the report to coincide with publication on our website of the “Global Warming 500” (not a final title), a list of the top 500 investors in ExxonMobil. Since the top investors include banks, credit card companies, and other institutions with public faces (see the chart below), we figure that people doing business with these institutions have the right to know about and challenge their relationship to ExxonMobil and global warming.

When we launch the Global Warming 500, you will be able to use our website to look up companies with whom you have a checking account, or a credit card, or a 401k, and see if that company owns ExxonMobil stock. If it does, you will be able to write a letter to that company asking them to vote their shares in support of the environmental resolutions this year. Or, if you own shares in ExxonMobil through that institutional investor, you can tell them how to vote your shares.

People will also be able to view and create lists of top shareholders, like the one below. This will be the first time such lists have been used for this kind of campaign.

Top Ten ExxonMobil Shareholders
INSTITUTIONAL SHAREHOLDER # OF SHARES
(AS OF Dec. 31, 2001)
BARCLAYS GBL INVESTORS, N.A. 244,840,083
FIDELITY MGMT & RESEARCH CO 206,860,626
J.P.MORGAN FLEMING ASSET MGMT 166,214,592
STATE STR GLOBAL ADVR (U.S.) 157,792,850
VANGUARD GROUP 112,104,778
J. P. MORGAN/CHASE MANHATTEN(N.Y.) 93,882,399
MELLON PRIVATE ASSET MGMT 74,848,313
WELLINGTON MANAGEMENT CO, LLP 72,024,168
PUTNAM INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT 69,193,674
DEUTSCHE ASSET MGMT (U.S.) 61,588,792
TIAA-CREF INVESTMENT MGMT INC. 59,788,796

Another way to demand accountability is to go straight to the board of directors. Two years ago, I met with Michael Boskin, an ExxonMobil board member from Stanford University. When I asked him what would convince him of the threat of global warming, he said, “When ExxonMobil tells me its real, I’ll believe its real.”

Hardly a heartening response, but still, it’s imperative to keep trying, because board members are powerful people, the ones who can really make a difference. We’re working on some new approaches to help highlight the role of the individual board member in the company’s conduct. For example, we’re starting a postcard campaign to the ExxonMobil board. Just download the ready-to-go postcards, print them out, and mail them. Try it!

There’s more than postcards, though. Next week Sister Pat Daly and I will go to the Sprint company’s annual meeting to present a resolution on global warming. Why Sprint? Because the chairman and CEO, William Esrey, is an ExxonMobil board member. He’s clearly not getting quality information from ExxonMobil, so we’ll try to get it to him at Sprint. Also, Sprint’s competitors are taking action on global warming. According to Adam Markham at Clean Air-Cool Planet, Verizon has an internal global warming gas reduction program and is installing fuel cells at a call-routing center. International telecommunications companies are also taking action, so Sprint should be developing its own response, too, or it will be in danger of missing the boat.

One good thing about the Sprint annual meeting: I’ll finally get to leave this chair! Pat and I leave Empowering Democracy on Monday afternoon, fly to Kansas City for the meeting, make press visits, and then high-tail it back to Washington, D.C., for an investor briefing the next morning.

In the meantime, I have just enough time after my last phone call to get a few notes typed up, reply to some emails, and edit a fundraising letter before the next call, this one about the Empowering Democracy training. Next, a two-hour meeting on a side project: A team of environmental and faith groups are working together to market Texas-generated renewable electricity to our members. We drive the market for new renewable power plants, we get our members to buy 100 percent renewable, and instead of profits to shareholders, excess revenues go to the groups. We are briefed on the progress of the business plan and send its authors back to their spreadsheets with new input. Fun!

After, oh yes, another call and a few more minor tasks, I pedal out of the office — stopping at the drug store to pick up my monthly sack of asthma medications. You really notice air pollution when you’re an asthmatic on a bike.