At the end of July, the world’s hottest month on record, the United Nations Secretary General, António Guterres, declared that global boiling had begun.

A week later, during the region’s usual winter period, Argentina’s capital broke its record for the hottest start to August in 117 years. The world’s highest lake in Bolivia, Lake Titicaca, is also disappearing in a drought, putting pressure on local indigenous communities.

Meanwhile, the United States is experiencing a trifecta of blazing heat, smoky air, and a tropical storm, “a sampler of the extreme weather events that scientists say are likely to become more commonplace under fossil fuel-driven climate change.” As of 15 August, the wildfires in Hawaii are expected to claim 10 to 20 lives a day, with 1300 people reported missing so far.

The notion of fossil fuel driving such extreme weather events is no longer conjecture. Fossil fuels, namely coal, oil and gas, comprise over 75 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions, the biggest contributor to the ongoing global climate crisis. As greenhouse gas emissions fill the Earth’s atmosphere, they trap the sun’s heat.

While some museums have cut their ties with problematic fossil fuel companies such as BP, there seems to be widespread and wilful ignorance regarding one of the largest drivers of fossil fuel production today – private equity. 

According to Private Equity Climate Risks Project’s 2022 Scorecard & Report, 10 of the largest private equity buyout firms had energy portfolios that comprised at least 80 percent of fossil fuel investments, as of October 2021.

This is mainly because private equity asset managers have repeatedly acquired and operated fossil fuel assets being shed by public entities in recent years. They have done so “out of the public eye and beyond the oversight of financial regulators,” spending billions to “to drill, frack, transport, store, refine fossil fuels, and generate energy.”

These actions blatantly go against working towards the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming scenario strongly advocated and legislated by climate scientists and policymakers worldwide.

Speaking with the Guardian this April, Alec Connon, co-director of Stop the Money Pipeline, a network of 240-plus organisations working with the financial industry to meet the goals of the Paris climate agreement, said, “If we’re going to tackle the climate crisis, we need to face up to the problem of private equity.”

One of the firms reportedly leading the way as a major fossil fuel producer is the Carlyle Group, doubling its average annual greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel investments over the past decade. This was calculated via a tool developed by the Initiative Climat International (iCI) to document private equity firms’ direct and indirect emissions through publicly available information and verification of which oil, gas and coal companies they invest in, back or own.

The Carlyle Group invests $16 in fossil fuels for every $1 the firm spends on renewable energy, according to the more recent Private Equity Climate Risks April 2023 report.

Co-Founder and Co-Chairman of The Carlyle Group, David M. Rubenstein, has been serving on the board of trustees at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., since 2015. He also served as a member of the Trustees’ Council from 2005 to 2010.

Over at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Hamilton (Tony) E. James, the Executive Vice Chairman of one of the world’s largest private equity funds, The Blackstone Group, is Co-Chair on the museum’s board of trustees.

The Private Equity Climate Risks report states that Blackstone-backed power plants produced 18.1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions in 2020, equivalent to 4 million gasoline-burning cars.

The study also names Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), the fourth-largest private equity firm in the US, reportedly because of its fossil fuel investments. Co-founder and Co-Executive Chairman Henry Kravis’ wife, Marie-Josée Kravis, is the Museum of Modern Art’s current Chair. Additionally, a gallery in the museum is named after the Kravis’, drawing the ire of climate activists this June.

However, is it fair to say that museums are entirely culpable for turning to private equity, given the decline in public funding for the arts? Last month, the US House Appropriations Committee passed a new bill that could see major cuts for various museums – Smithsonian’s annual budget would be slashed by 16 percent and National Gallery of Art’s budget slashed by 15 percent.

London’s institutions received a £50m cut in Arts Council England (ACE) funding over the span of three years. The Swedish government cut its 2023 budget for culture by SEK 1 billion and eschewed free entrance for state museums due to the recession.

The ties between museums and fossil fuel investments need to be disentangled but government budget cuts are likely to engender cultural institutions becoming PR fronts for private equity associated with the fossil fuel industry.

Nonetheless, the art world seems reticent to pay real attention to what is shaping up to be a crucial reckoning, with globally renowned art museums still struggling to understand the existential threat that affects all human culture.

Hopefully a much-needed shift in perspective will happen before it is too late. After all, in the words of the Head of World Meteorological Organization: “Climate action is not a luxury but a must.”

Author’s Note: H/T to Brad Johnson’s Hill Heat Newsletter for inspiring this month’s analysis.