Hello and welcome to this special bonus episode of Outrageant Optimism. I'm Paul Dickinson.

There is no doubt that asset allocators. That's the pension funds of the world. They have a huge

role to play in the transition of the energy sector in infrastructure and the built environment.

In fact, today they have 50 trillion US dollars worth of assets. That's about half the GDP of the

whole world. It's a huge amount of money. In case it's not obvious already, pensions are our money,

our retirement savings invested on our behalf. So of course, we want these funds to be

financially successful, which means we have enough to retire on. But increasingly, we're finding

that we want to know what they are financing. And sometimes we're shocked to find out how pension

fund investments are totally contradictory to our own values and principles. This week, our own

Cristiana Figueroz talked to the net zero pension summit hosted by Richard Curtis, the famous

filmmaker, and also a serial co-founder of campaigns. Richard's most recent campaign organization is

called Make My Money Matter. And working with the counters in campaign globally, Make My Money Matter

is elevating the voices of citizens to demand that pension funds invest in line with the values

of their members. Now on the other side of the coin, this podcast is heavily promoted the role

of shareholders in moving fossil fuel companies like Exxon and Chevron and even redesigning their

boards. Did you know that the largest shareholders in these companies are often pension funds? So imagine

the power of your pension. If your pension invests in line with your values, they will be on track

for net zero. And if they're on track for net zero by 2050 at the latest throughout their portfolios,

well, they are then going to need to use their immense power to totally change the economy.

This bonus episode gives you a flavor of the net zero pension summit, and we hope it will

propel you to take a step yourself and log it on countersin.org. Now without further ado,

let's hear from these fantastic people. First of all, Richard Curtis, filmmaker and co-founder

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