Opinion

2022: The Year ESG Fell to Earth

12/29/2022|Updated: 1/2/2023

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Commentary

The year 2022 brings an end to an era of illusions: a year that saw the end of the post-Cold War era and the return of geopolitics, the first energy crisis of the enforced energy transition to net zero, and the year that brought environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing down to earth with a thump—for the year to date, BlackRock’s ESG Screened S&P 500 ETF lost 22.2 percent of its value, and the S&P 500 Energy Sector Index rose 54 percent.

Rupert Darwall

Author

Rupert Darwall is a senior fellow of the RealClear Foundation and author of the books “The Age of Global Warming: A History,” “Green Tyranny: Exposing the Totalitarian Roots of the Climate Industrial Complex,” and “Going Through the Motions: The Industrial Strategy Green Paper.” Darwall also authored the reports “The Climate Noose: Business, Net Zero, and the IPCC’s Anti-Capitalism,” “Capitalism, Socialism and ESG,” “Climate-Risk Disclosure: A Flimsy Pretext for a Green Power Grab,” “The Anti-Development Bank: The World Bank’s Regressive Energy Policies,” and “The Folly of Climate Leadership.”