For BNP Paribas, 2023 was marked by a simultaneous acceleration in financing dedicated to low-carbon energy and withdrawal from financing fossil fuel exploration and production. To coincide with the publication of its 2024 Climate Report, the Group has made new commitments in three sectors with high CO2 emissions: air transport, maritime transport and commercial property.
Determined to align its credit portfolio with net zero trajectories and to support the economy in its transition to low-carbon, BNP Paribas is committed to significantly reducing the greenhouse gas emission intensity of its financing to sectors with the highest emissions. In addition, the 2023 commitment to achieve 80% low-carbon financing for the Group’s energy production by 2030 has been brought forward by two years, to 2028. The target for 2030 is now 90%.
Targets set for 6 sectors in 2022 and 2023…
In 2022, the Group committed to decarbonising its portfolio in three key sectors: oil and gas, power generation and automotive. By the fourth quarter of 2023, the exposure reduction targets set for 2025 had already been achieved for the oil and gas sectors. In 2023, new targets were set for the steel, aluminium and cement production sectors.
… followed by 3 new sectors in 2024
This year, BNP Paribas is extending its commitments to three new key sectors: aviation, shipping and commercial real estate. By 2030, BNP Paribas is targeting an 18% reduction in its portfolio emissions intensity for air transport compared with the 2022 baseline, a reduction of at least 23% for maritime transport and at least 31% for commercial property compared with 2022 as well.
Special focus on agriculture and residential real estate
The Group also places a particular focus on the agriculture and residential real estate sectors, although it has not yet set net-zero quantitative targets for these areas. Why? Agriculture is a highly fragmented and diverse sector: wide variety of agricultural products, with very different greenhouse gas emissions depending on crops, farming practices and climatic zones; a great diversity of climates and soils; a lack of reliable climate data at farm level; etc. As far as the residential real estate sector is concerned, decarbonisation is largely dependent on the local energy mix, which varies from one European country to another, and on regulatory changes that are still uncertain: local regulations are still evolving and the national implementations of the European directive on the energy performance of buildings have yet to be determined.
Target of 70% reduction in financed emissions in absolute terms for the oil and gas sector
In its 2024 Climate Report, BNP Paribas has also included a 70% reduction target for its financed emissions in the oil and gas sector (from 27.3 million tonnes of CO2e at the end of September 2022 to 8.2 MtCO2e in 2030), which replaces the previous emissions intensity indicator. This new indicator has been developed to provide a more comprehensive evaluation of the impact of the Group’s strategy of exiting oil and gas exploration and production activities.