Statement: HOOPP’s incoming CEO must leave behind TC Energy’s fossil fuel expansionism, greenwashing and false narratives
SHIFT ACTION FOR PENSION WEALTH & PLANET HEALTH
For Immediate Release: December 3, 2024
Toronto, ON | Traditional territories of the Wendat, Anishnaabeg, Haudenosaunee, Chippewa and Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation
Amidst a worsening climate crisis and accelerating transition off fossil fuels, pension funds must have leadership that can successfully protect their assets from climate impacts and navigate their portfolios to net-zero. In this context, it is concerning that HOOPP’s incoming President and CEO Annesley Wallace, announced yesterday, will be moving to the fund from her role as an executive vice president at TC Energy, an energy company with a business model that runs in direct opposition to a credible science-based transition plan.
Shift has previously documented the problematic interconnections and entanglements between the pension sector and the oil and gas industry. Fortunately for the 460,000 HOOPP members hoping for a dignified retirement in a safe climate future, Ms. Wallace’s time with TC Energy is the exception rather than the rule: most of her career has been spent at pension funds, with 11 years at OMERS during which she held roles as Chief Pension Officer and as head of infrastructure.
Still, it is puzzling that a pension fund that recognizes that “Collective and sustained [climate] action is urgently required” would choose an executive from TC Energy, a company with a uniquely terrible track record of failing to align with science-based climate targets and policy. TC Energy is expanding gas infrastructure across North America, lobbying to exempt methane and LNG plants from Canada’s proposed oil and gas emissions cap, facing a review by BC’s lobbyist watchdog for the company’s role in undermining climate policy and attempted to sue the U.S. government for blocking the construction of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. According to the Net Zero Benchmark of Climate Engagement Canada, of which HOOPP is a member, TC Energy is failing across the board to align its business with net-zero.
As Ms. Wallace takes the reins at a fund that has signalled it intends to expand its infrastructure portfolio, HOOPP must seek to avoid the pitfalls that other Canadian pension funds have fallen into, such as:
buying gas pipeline networks at a time when climate imperatives and electric alternatives are ushering in the phase-out of gas;
wrongly believing gas pipelines can be repurposed for hydrogen use;
investing in pipelines, such as TC Energy’s own Coastal GasLink, that fly in the face of climate goals and violate Indigenous rights;
ignoring the failed engagement attempts of international investors and instead trying to engage oil and gas companies, which have proven themselves to be unable or unwilling to align on climate.
HOOPP has already committed to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 and, as of 2025, has placed an exclusion on new direct private investment in thermal coal companies and oil exploration and production companies. The pension fund’s exclusion notably does not mention gas or pipelines, making the above pitfalls even more crucial to avoid.
HOOPP beneficiaries, who want to believe that their pension fund’s climate strategy is “good for the Plan and the planet”, must remind Ms. Wallace that the International Energy Agency (IEA) has confirmed every year since 2021 that a global net-zero by 2050 pathway requires no new investment in coal, oil or gas. A comprehensive analysis of net-zero pathway models finds that new fossil fuels are incompatible with achieving the goal of limiting global heating to 1.5°C. The IEA said this year that global demand for gas is expected to peak before 2030, under all policy scenarios, and even earlier in scenarios that project more stringent climate policies. The scenarios prompted the IEA to conclude that “there is little headroom remaining for either pipeline or LNG trade to grow beyond (2030).”
As Ms. Wallace prepares to clear out her desk at a gas pipeline company and assume leadership at a $112-billion pension fund whose ability to fulfill its mandate depends on a stable climate, let’s hope she also clears out any fossil fuel industry narratives that could wreck the plan and the planet.
For more information:
2023 Canadian Pension Climate Report Card - analysis of HOOPP
Climate Engagement Canada - 2024 Company Assessment - TC Energy
Contact information:
Adam Scott, Director, Shift Action for Pension Wealth & Planet Health
416-347-3858
Shift: Action for Pension Wealth and Planet Health is a charitable initiative that works to protect pensions and the climate by bringing together beneficiaries and their pension funds to engage on the climate crisis.
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