Banks, Companies Turn against Coal as Leaders Seek Cash for Climate

Major banks and companies vowed Tuesday to accelerate the move away from Earth-warming fossil fuels as world leaders met in Paris seeking to unlock new cash for the global economy’s shift to greener energy, according to AFP.

Two years to the day since 195 nations sealed the Paris Agreement to avert worst- case- scenario climate change, the World Bank said it would stop financing oil and gas exploration and extraction -- about two percent of its portfolio now -- from 2019.

On the sidelines of a summit of some 60 leaders called by French President Emmanuel Macron, French insurer Axa said it would speed up its carbon sector divestment, pulling 2.5 billion euros ($ 2.9 billion) from companies which derive more than 30 percent of their revenues from coal.

Dutch bank ING said it would have “close to zero exposure” to coal power generation by 2025, and a group of more than 200 global investors, including banking giant HSBC, launched a campaign to pressurise the world’s largest corporate greenhouse gas emitters -- including BP, Airbus, Volkswagen, and Glencore -- to go greener.

Summit participants, meanwhile, warned that trillions of dollars must be invested in clean energy technology to meet the Paris Agreement’s existential goal of limiting global warming to under two degrees Celsius ( 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre- industrial levels.

“While the challenge is great, we must do everything in our power to meet it. We know it is the difference between life and death for millions of vulnerable people around the world,” said Frank Bainimarama, the prime minister of Fiji who presided over UN climate talks in Bonn last month.