In 2023, Canada experienced its worst wildfire season on record as more than 40 million acres burnt in a matter of months. In recent years, people across Canada have experienced killer heatwaves, disastrous flooding, and choking air pollution.
This is climate chaos and it's a crisis funded by Canadian financial institutions.
Canada's banks and insurance firms are among the world's largest funders of oil, gas, and coal. They are funding carbon pollution that is putting all of us at risk and making our daily lives increasingly unaffordable.
At the same time, many of these financial institutions have made commitments to reach a net-zero emissions future -- a goal that amounts to nothing more than greenwashing if institutions continue to invest in fossil fuels.
It's time to tell your financial institution that enough is enough.
Write a letter today to Canada's banks and insurers — some of the worst offenders fueling climate chaos — telling them it's time to end their financial support of carbon pollution.
Dear Board of Directors,
Climate change is an existential threat to the future of humanity and all life on earth. But there is a clear solution to averting climate disaster — stop burning fossil fuels and achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.
Although your institution has made a commitment to reaching net zero, it does not have a plan for how it will get there. At the same time your institution continues to pour money into fossil fuel companies, including those with fossil fuel expansion plans.
As directors of a federally regulated institution, you have a responsibility to assess, understand, manage and disclose the risks that climate change presents to your institution.
By investing and financing fossil fuels, you are increasing the financial risk to your institution. It accelerates the extreme weather events that threaten the institution's operations, employees and balance sheet.
The federal finance minister, Chrystia Freeland has declared that the global economy is turning swiftly, decisively, and irreversibly green and shifting towards sustainable sources of energy. In this context, your institution's investment in fossil fuels could become a stranded asset and your financing could lose value substantially and unexpectedly.
Failing to manage climate risk exposes you and your institution to litigation risks. Climate change litigation, including against directors and in the financial services industry, is on the rise.
In addition to exposing your institution to climate-related financial risk, your actions are also contributing to the climate impacts that are already degrading the lives, health, and wealth of your clients, as well as people across the country and the globe. Climate change makes life less and less affordable.
Climate change is driven by burning oil, gas, and coal for energy. By continuing to fund fossil fuels, the safety and wellbeing of everyone is at risk. However, some communities are at greater risk from the impacts of climate change than others, especially youth and Indigenous Peoples.
You should be assessing and managing climate risks to avoid the worst financial impacts of climate change.
To manage climate risk, I urge you to create and implement a credible climate transition plan aligned with the 1.5 degrees Celsius goal of the Paris Agreement to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. A key piece of this plan must also shift the institution's investment and lending away from supporting climate chaos.
Our collective futures depend on the choices that you make.
Sincerely,
[your name]
