Fossil Fuel Banks and Their Curiously Positive Attitude: A Greenwashing Guide

It’s rare to see a fossil-fuel industry funding, globe-spanning, multi-national bank that doesn’t have a positive attitude on the climate crisis. After all, now that they’ve loudly and very publicly committed to a net-zero future, we simply have nothing to worry about. We can quietly sweep all of that fracking, petrochemical and oil exploration nonsense under the rug, where it’s always belonged. 

According to some of our ‘favourite’ banks, it’s much more important to underline their shiny new commitments to a better future, which they’ve demonstrated by running some of their offices on renewable energy. With groundbreaking and revolutionary commitments such as these, we can forget the $6,900,000,000,000 these banks have poured into the fossil fuel industry over the last eight years. Not that they have any plans to stop, of course. They’ve been putting so many solar panels on their office blocks that they can’t help funding an oilfield every once in a while. 

Banks use words like a smokescreen. They firmly believe that if you just close your eyes against that pesky smoke and keep on walking, you won’t even notice you’ve walked into a bonfire. Overwhelmed by the diesel fumes and wood smoke, we’re positively light-headed at the thought of an exceedingly bright and fiery future. And into this brave future we shall march, standing on the shoulders of immortal clichés such as ‘we are working towards’, ‘we aim to achieve’ and the amazing ‘we continue to broaden our efforts’. 

A Quick Greenwashing Glossary 

When they say: We’re committed to achieving.... 
They mean: We’ve just hired a public-relations specialist to deal with bad press. 

When they say: We’re consulting with stakeholders...
They mean: We’re making too much money to change, and frankly, can’t be bothered. 

When they say: We’re at the forefront of... 
They mean: We’ve just put the kettle on, and we might get on to that a little bit later. 

When they say: We’re strengthening our climate policies...
They mean: We’ve asked the marketing team, and they’ve come up with this nifty new document for us. 

When they say: Investment is still needed to support existing energy supply chains...
They mean: As you can see, we’ve no interest in making any changes whatsoever. 

Leading from the Front 

Strolling through the ‘climate strategy’ documents of the world’s largest fossil fuel-funding banks might actually convince you everything’s going to be alright. Positive messages are wrapped up in statistics, verified internally and giftwrapped for the customer. While banks are mysteriously quiet about the emissions that their financial investments lead to, they’d be delighted for you to know more about their electric car fleet (under development).  

When banks are putting the spotlight on some of the most insignificant pieces of their business, it’s time to start looking under the rug again. We love to see companies electrifying, of course. But this all has to be taken into context. When a big bank decides to fund a new oil pipeline, or a new fracking operation, they can spend billions upon billions of your money to do so – and an electric car fleet sure isn’t going to make up for the emissions those projects create. 

In just 8 years, J.P Morgan & Chase has spent $430 billion dollars on funding the climate crisis.  Overall, banks have provided $705 billion dollars in funding the fossil fuel industry in 2023 alone.  

And the green efforts they trumpet are also far weaker than the fanfare would make you think. While we wouldn’t want to name and shame any of our dearest friends, or banks, none of these institutions has actually reached 100% renewable energy for their internal operations. But never mind all of that, haven’t you heard how proud they are to have reduced their Scope 1 and 2 emissions? 

Scope 1 and 2, you say? Those are surely the most important ones, seeing as they come first on the scale. Unfortunately for those with a basic, intuitive sense of how numbers work, Scope 1 and 2 emissions actually account for the smallest amount of emissions a bank produces. It’s banking nonsense for ‘internal business operations’, similar to a utilities bill. 

Scope 3 emissions, the one they’ve forgotten to mention, consists of all the emissions they continue to fund, invest in and create today with your money, such as oilfields and strip mines. Scope 3 emissions account for the vast majority of a bank's emissions.  

Perhaps their Microsoft Word subscription ran out before they could include it. You should email and ask.  

What We Like to Call ‘Greenlighting’ 

While we hate new-fangled terminology as much as anyone, the banking sector has forced our hand. You’ve heard of greenwashing, but delving deeper into the belly of the beast reveals ‘greenlighting,’ which makes up part of the overall ‘lying through their teeth’ picture. 

Greenlighting means putting the spotlight on smaller problems and solutions, with the intention of taking the focus away from the big difficulties. For instance, a bank’s climate strategy mentions their new bike-to-work scheme and how great it is for the environment. It’s available for all employees and removes tonnes of carbon emissions from the atmosphere every year! Sounds amazing, doesn’t it? 

Cycling is great, of course, but we have to consider whether or not a bike-to-work scheme is more important than, say, not burning down the Amazon rainforest? 

Signs Your Bank is Greenlighting You 

• They’ve got this ‘innovative’ new bike-to-work scheme plastered across their website, but, for some reason, haven’t mentioned their new oilrig project. 
• They have a strange habit of putting pictures of solar panels on their ‘sustainability’ pages, while investing millions in coal, peat and gas power plants. 
• They have recently been holding press conferences about the electrification of their ‘internal operations’, forgetting to mention their miraculous funding of gas-guzzling coal mines, mass deforestation and fracking. 
• They’ve accidentally put statements like ‘we’re expanding our commitments’, ‘taking affirmative action’, and ‘considering new developments’ in their climate strategies, when they’ve clearly meant to put it in their burn-down-the-planet strategy document. 
• They’ve started adding the anacronym ‘ESG’ to every paragraph about their financial investments, conveniently changing the meaning of ‘sustainable’ to hide dirty funding and lie straight to your face. 

Why Do They Do It? 

Obviously, banks want to highlight their achievements more than their wrongdoings. We’re happy to see them making any progress at all, and we can’t deny that many banks fund green initiatives, renewable energy and sustainable practices.  

Greenlighting, however, is not the way to do it. Diversionary tactics such as these aim to fool and confuse people into focusing on the wrong issues. It’s almost as if banks prefer to focus on solving the smallest, cheapest and easiest problems for marketing opportunities. In fact, judging by the number of times banks use the word ‘commitment’ in their climate strategies and website copy, we’re pretty sure they’re all copy and pasting from the same sheet. 

Barclays uses ‘addressing,’ which we feel is a nice change of pace. Good for them. 

Is It Working For Them? 

For the most part, yes, greenlighting has been very successful for the banking industry. By putting a positive spin on things and highlighting their most insignificant achievements in the media, many people can be and are deceived. For many people, especially in Western societies, it’s hard to imagine banks getting away with such complicit rule-breaking and climate-destroying activities. They get away with this sort of thing because they’re monumentally and incredibly rich.  

By delaying the switch to renewable energy and sustainable banking projects, they’re able to squeeze every last dollar/pound out of the fossil fuel industry. It’s still a ridiculously lucrative business, and large corporations famously lack any type of morals when it comes to money. The vast majority of big banks are absolutely no different.  

Calling Them Out 

Despite their incessant whining about ‘shareholder consultations’, ‘developing green policies’ and ‘continued awareness’ about the environment, banks are money machines. Money - how to get it and how to keep getting it - is their only concern. If large groups of people stopped giving it to them, there could be real change in how banks operate. That’s where we come in, of course.  

Deny banks the opportunity to use your money to fund the climate crisis. Move it and make your money matter with a green, sustainable bank. Banks love to use financial jargon and ‘sustainable’ finance nonsense to trick us into believing them. Do your research, bank wisely, and bank green, as much as you can.