A report released today by Rainforest Action Network, BankTrack, Sierra Club and Oil Change International, in partnership with 28 organisations around the world, reveals that the world’s biggest banks are continuing to fuel climate change through the financing of extreme fossil fuels. The report finds that 2016 actually saw a steep fall in bank funding for extreme fossil fuels — however despite this overall reduction, banks are still funding extreme fossil fuel projects at a rate that will push us beyond the 1.5 degrees climate change…

A letter by ten signatory banks to the Equator Principles, a risk management framework for project finance, has emerged in which the banks call for changes to the Equator Principles to ensure “lessons are learned” from the financing of the Dakota Access Pipeline project (DAPL). The letter, which has been widely circulated but not previously published, is the first public sign of discord among the 90 Equator Principles banks, and follows intense international criticism of the seventeen banks that provided financing for…

The United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on Monday published a 16-page interpretive advice note on the banking sector’s responsibilities for managing the human rights impacts of its finance. The advisory note – the OHCHR’s most detailed guidance to the banking sector to date – comes in advance of a meeting next Monday 19th June organised by the Thun Group, an informal grouping of banks on human rights, at which a recent controversial paper by the group of banks will be discussed. The…

Global banks need to tighten their policies to prevent them from financing companies whose activities could damage World Heritage sites Two-thirds of people expect their bank not to lend to companies involved in harmful industrial activities, such as mining and oil exploration, in UNESCO World Heritage sites WWF is launching a report detailing the urgent action needed by the banking industry which shows how banks can play their part in safeguarding our critical natural capital A new report by WWF reveals that, despite some good practice, no major…

This week, over 20 Indigenous and environmental organizations, including BankTrack, delivered an open letter to 28 major banks, calling on them to back away from funding the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project (TMEP). The warning letter urges banks to avoid the reputational and financial risk of supporting this destructive project, which is incompatible with realizing the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement and respecting human rights, especially those detailed in the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. “Mark my words,…