The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 13 Climate Action and Efforts of UK Banks Toward a Low Carbon Economy?
Wesley L. Harris and
Jarunee Wonglimpiyarat
Additional contact information
Wesley L. Harris: Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge 02139, MA, USA
Jarunee Wonglimpiyarat: Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge 02139, MA, USA
International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM), 2024, vol. 21, issue 07, 1-24
Abstract:
Banks are increasingly motivated to align their business operations with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as this can help them attract investors and build a more loyal customer base in the long run. This paper explores whether major UK banks (HSBC Holdings Plc, Lloyds Banking Group Plc, Barclays Plc, Standard Chartered Plc, and NatWest Group Plc) are increasing their involvement in green banking by transitioning away from fossil fuels. The research gathered expert and policymaker views on decarbonization (reducing carbon footprint) at the Scotland Policy Conference UK in 2022 to support its findings. The results reveal slow progress toward a green banking regime, as the banks continued underwriting fossil fuel IPOs and bond issuances, and funding carbon-intensive industries. Their portfolios primarily consist of fossil fuel projects, with implications for insufficient effort toward meeting UN SDGs related to global climate commitments. The study proposes a policy recommendation: governments should introduce regulations requiring banks to develop a minimum percentage of financial products and services designed to support SDG-related activities, fostering a low-carbon economy.
Keywords: Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); fossil fuel; green banking; HSBC; Lloyds; Barclays; standard chartered; NatWest (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0219877024500536
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wsi:ijitmx:v:21:y:2024:i:07:n:s0219877024500536
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
DOI: 10.1142/S0219877024500536
Access Statistics for this article
International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM) is currently edited by H K Tang
More articles in International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM) from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tai Tone Lim ().