Today we’re proud to join a new UK coalition of the Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF), an initiative supporting banks and investors to assess and disclose the greenhouse gas emissions of their portfolios. Globally PCAF is now made up of over 77 financial institutions with over $13 trillion in assets.
Standardising carbon accounting in the financial sector is crucial to help financial institutions align their financial flows with the goals of the Paris Agreement – to keep temperature rise this century to ‘well below’ 2°C , and pursue efforts to limit temperature rise to 1.5°C. PCAF is an industry-led initiative which aims to bring about that standardised approach. Its methodology enables financial institutions to account for the greenhouse gas footprint of loans and investments, as well as operations such as office energy use and travel.
What does joining the PCAF mean for CDC specifically? First, we will join efforts to refine and implement PCAF’s methodology in a UK context and help to mainstream carbon accounting within the financial sector. Second, it will help to inform our own approach to implementing the net zero building block of our alignment with the Paris Agreement. As outlined in our recently published Climate Change Strategy, we’re currently creating a baseline of our portfolio emissions using the PCAF methodology, as we move to decarbonise our portfolio to reach net zero portfolio emissions by 2050.
We’re pleased to be joining the International business of Federated Hermes, Triodos Bank UK, NatWest Group, Investec plc, Lloyd’s Banking Group, Ecology Building Society and Nationwide Building Society as initial members of this UK coalition.
