Oil and gas companies have pledged £41 million to 44 UK universities, with Shell, Petronas and BP being the largest contributors.
The data, presented in freedom of information requests submitted by climate journalism site De Smog, looked at funds spanning this current academic year, with some funding going as far ahead as 2027.
According to the results, contributors Shell, Petronas and BP (British Petroleum) accounted for over 76% of the total figure. Shell recently came under for not doing enough to fund renewable energy, with its boss Wael Sawan facing internal pressure.
In addition, according to Make My Money Matter, which submitted FOI requests between July and August 2023, at least 90 universities who said they had divested from fossil fuels in fact have links with banks including HSBC, Santander, Natwest and Lloyds.
The organisation said that the universities all banked with at least on of the UK’s big five high street banks.
Subscribe to Sustainability Beat for free
Sign up here to get the latest sustainability news sent straight to your inbox each morning
It added that more than 73% of the universities bank with Barclays, which it described as “Europe’s biggest financer of fossil fuels since 2016”.
The list included the University of Glasgow, which was the first university to divest from fossil fuels in 2014.
The organisation is calling on students and former students of the universities concerned to contact the institutions via its website.
In June, Bishop Grosseteste became one of the latest universities to exclude oil gas and mining companies from future career events on campus, following in the steps of the University of Bedfordshire, the University of the Arts London and Wrexham Glyndwr University.
Swathes of organisations, including the Church of England, the British Museum and the LGBT awards have been stepping away from sponsorship deals with fossil fuel companies, amid public fears about the impact of the industries on climate change.
