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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBankrolling Climate Change: Study Shows Banking Sector Major Source of Climate Disruption
CONTACT: Rainforest Action Network (RAN)
New Report Shows Banking Sector as Major Source of Climate Disruption
SAN FRANCISCO - October 30 - A number of major banks, including Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase, invest in the acceleration of climate change each year by committing billions to polluting energy industries like coal, according to a report published by Rainforest Action Networks program today.
The report, titled Bankrolling Climate Disruption: The Impacts of the Banking Sectors Financed Emissions, finds that major banks have failed to reduce investment in carbon-intensive companies at a time of global climate chaos. The report also demonstrates that major banks have failed to properly measure their carbon footprint, despite the availability of comprehensive guidelines enabling them to do so.
Rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have begun to disrupt the global climate, triggering extreme weather events around the globe, said Ben Collins, Research and Policy Campaigner for RAN. To address this growing climate crisis, the global economy must rapidly transition to low-carbon energy sources that can power our future.
While the transition could pose challenges for the banking sector, which hold financial relationships to some of the most polluting industries like coal, the report offers guidance on both measuring and reducing emissions.
Banks will need to shift financing from fossil fuel-based power sources to low-carbon energy infrastructure for our communities and the climate, Collins continued. One way of doing that is by measuring the climate impact of investments and committing to reduction targets for financed emissions, now.
RANs report draws attention to the chasm between the relatively modest climate impact of the banking sectors physical operations and that of the energy and mining companies it finances. According to the report, financed emissions the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions generated by investments in fossil fuels--increase the magnitude of carbon output of the worlds major banks. The report points out that, while banks have adopted policies to address the pollution from their offices and branches, they fail to measure or reduce the emissions induced by loans, investments, and other financial services of fossil fuel companies.
The report cites JPMorgan Chase as an example, highlighting the disparity between its ambitious goal of reducing its GHG emissions to 80% of 2005 levels by 2012, and its relationship with Duke Energy, which in 2010 was one of the largest carbon emitters in the US electric power sector.....
http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2012/10/30-2
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Bankrolling Climate Change: Study Shows Banking Sector Major Source of Climate Disruption (Original Post)
amborin
Oct 2012
OP
Uncle Joe
(58,363 posts)1. Kicked and recommended.
Thanks for the thread, amborin.
PDJane
(10,103 posts)2. Indeed. Thank you very much.
pretty much what I had figured.