(C) OpenDemocracy This story was originally published by OpenDemocracy and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . How to stop banks fuelling climate chaos [1] [] Date: 2022-07 The world’s largest banks are investing billions into heavily polluting industries, despite publicly endorsing measures intended to combat the climate crisis. The banking system is being financially incentivised to prioritise the still-profitable oil, gas and coal industries over long-term investments in emerging renewable technologies – and is likely to continue doing so without strict political oversight. In March, a report entitled ‘Banking on Climate Chaos’ revealed that, despite the use of cynical PR tactics and attempts to ‘offset’ carbon emissions through carbon reduction initiatives, the 60 largest private banks in the world had poured $4.6tn (£3.8tn) into fossil fuels since the 2015 Paris Agreement. Barclays Bank, according to the report, had provided the equivalent of £4.1bn for new fossil fuel projects between January 2021 and the COP26 summit in November 2021. JP Morgan Chase, however, was named as the most egregious polluter, with over $382bn in new fossil fuel investments between 2016 and 2021. The bank had set a number of misleading decarbonisation targets the previous year, pledging to reduce the intensity of its emissions, a measure that still permitted overall future fossil fuel investments to increase. Get our free Daily Email Get one whole story, direct to your inbox every weekday. Sign up now Financial incentives for destruction Due to government policies that have extended the longevity of fossil fuels, locking in future coal, oil and gas development, major banks are being incentivised to keep financing environmentally destructive sources of energy. This is in spite of a United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report in April that advocated for the “decommissioning and reduced utilisation of existing fossil fuel installations in the power sector, as well as cancellation of new installations”. Indeed, resurgent post-pandemic energy demand, exacerbated by rising prices created by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, has made fossil fuel investment an attractive prospect for the financial sector. In May, Greenpeace predicted that companies are set to make an estimated £11.6bn windfall on UK oil and gas this year. Shell and BP made record profits in the first quarter of 2022, with Shell gaining £7.3bn, a tripling of the figures for the same period in 2021, and BP saw its profits double to £4.9bn. The British government has remained reluctant to impose a windfall tax on these companies, eventually issuing a meagre levy of 25%, which coincided with an 80% tax break on new fossil fuel investment. The tax break was condemned by the Greenpeace political campaigner Ami McCarthy, who argued that “this nearly doubles the tax relief available to fossil fuel giants, meaning the more investment they make, the less tax they pay. The chancellor has chosen to turbo-charge climate destruction. This isn’t just a bad move, it is completely unjustifiable.” Meanwhile, the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), an organisation established at COP26 by former Bank of England governor Mark Carney, has been accused of greenwashing. This came after the revelation last month of controversial new loopholes for banks looking to join the alliance – which permit them to continue investing in heavily polluting energy sources. According to The Guardian, the criteria that GFANZ had developed alongside the UN’s Race to Zero initiative (set up to encourage companies to adopt net zero targets) permitted banks to maintain fossil fuel investments beyond 2023 [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/bank-fossil-fuel-investment-finance-climate-change/ Published and (C) by OpenDemocracy Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/opendemocracy/