The news comes from WWF, which has announced that on 27 May the Finance Committee of the Norwegian Parliament confirmed that the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund will no longer invest in coal. This is a landmark development, as the fund is one of the largest investment funds in the world, the organisation notes, with $900 billion in investments.

The move could trigger a domino effect, leading first to the fund divesting approximately $5.5 billion from companies such as Germany's RWE, China Shenhua, Duke Energy from the United States, Australia's AGL Energy, and Poland's PGE, before having a knock-on effect across the entire international energy market.

The news follows data released by the IMF (International Monetary Fund), described as "shocking", revealing that fossil fuel companies receive $10 million per minute in subsidies. According to the Fund, eliminating subsidies in 2015 could increase government revenues by $2.9 billion (3.6 per cent of global GDP), cut global carbon emissions by more than 20 per cent and reduce premature deaths linked to air pollution by 55 per cent, saving 1.6 million lives every year.

It would appear, then, that the Norwegian Parliament has taken the IMF's recommendations to heart, and has heeded the calls made by the international campaign #DivestNorway, led by Future in our Hands, Greenpeace Norway and WWF Norway. The three organisations, in just a few weeks, gathered — in a joint effort with international partners 350.org, Avaaz and urgewald — tens of thousands of signatures in support of coal divestment.

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