Terra approach
Address
ING Bank N.V., pobočka zahraničnej bankyPribinova 10
811 09 Bratislava
IČO: 30 844 754
https://ingwb.sk/sk/home
Contact person
Matej Smekal+421 918 464 004
matej.smekal@ing.com
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Description
Climate change is an enormous threat to our world, there’s no doubt about that. In the Paris Climate Agreement, governments committed to take action to remain well below a two-degree rise in global temperatures compared to pre-industrial levels. Now, everyone has a role to play to make that happen. As a bank, ING makes the most impact through our financing, via the money we loan to companies and customers. We have a loan book of about €600 billion across many sectors, which we have begun steering towards meeting the Paris Agreement’s two-degree goal. We call our strategy to get there the Terra approach. How does ING’s Terra approach work? ING is focusing on the sectors in our loan book that are responsible for most greenhouse gas emissions: power generation, fossil fuels, automotive, shipping, aviation, steel, cement, residential mortgages and commercial real estate. We will measure and benchmark whether our lending in each sector is adding up to contribute to climate resilience. We’re able to do this because we’re co-creating an innovative, accurate way to measure the climate impact of our portfolio. Per sector, we use the most appropriate methodology available.
Economic benefits
ING is talking to other banks and stakeholders, building partnerships and coalitions that are bigger than ING itself. It believes that all banks would benefit from an industry-wide standard that would increase transparency and thus our collective effectiveness in the fight against climate change. For this reason, in December 2018, banks with a global footprint such as BBVA, BNP Paribas, Société Générale and Standard Chartered joined ING in signing the Katowice Commitment - a pledge to manage their portfolios in line with the Paris Climate Agreement's goal of keeping global temperature rise well below 2°C and to work together to further refine the parameters and tools needed to achieve it. In September 2019, the Katowice Commitment formed the basis for the UN-backed Joint Climate Commitment, signed by ING and 30 other banks with a combined lending volume of US$13 trillion. ING also published the first Terra Progress Report on the approach. Alongside it, it published its Climate Targets Scorecard, which illustrates ING's path to meeting its climate goals in each sector. This overview shows the carbon intensity of each sector.
Examples of implementation of the solution in practice
What else is ING doing for the climate? ING is fighting climate change in many ways. For example, by committing to reduce its carbon exposure to almost zero by 2025 and by rewarding companies for their sustainability improvements with more favourable loans. Billions of euros have financed wind farms, solar power generation and geothermal energy. In fact, it aims to double its climate finance portfolio by 2022 compared to 2017. Read more about ING's approach to climate protection. What is the 2nd Investment Initiative and why is ING partnering with it? The 2nd Investment Initiative is a leading global research institute focused on climate and long-term risk parameters and related policy options in financial markets. 2°ii coordinates the world's largest research projects on climate parameters in financial markets. It has more than 40 partners from the public, private and philanthropic sectors and has distributed many millions of dollars in grants to research partners to date. It is supported by bodies such as the European Commission and various European governments, as well as academia, think tanks and civil society.
