the International Energy Agency, reaching net-zero emissions by 2050 would mean ensuring “no new oil and gas fields.”
“But global banks have massively supported the companies doing the most to open new oil and gas fields,” notes the new report. “Banks with net-zero commitments last year… financed the top 20 upstream oil and gas expansion companies, potentially helping to lock the planet into decades of climate-warming emissions.”
Adele Shraiman, a representative for the Sierra Club’s Fossil-Free Finance campaign, said Wednesday that the analysis “makes it clear that banks must clean up their act and stop funding the expansion of dirty fossil fuel projects like fracked gas exports, tar sands pipelines, and offshore drilling in order to align with what the science demands and what their own commitments require.”
“Despite their splashy climate pledges, big banks have largely continued with business-as-usual and actually increased their overall fossil fuel financing since the Paris Agreement,” said Shraiman. “As we look ahead to shareholder season, we’ll be keeping up the pressure on the banks and their investors to take these critical reforms seriously and stop bankrolling the fossil fuel industry’s reckless expansion plans.
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