Commercial, GHG Emissions  -  September 22, 2021

American Financial Exchange Aims to Offset All Emissions From 2020

The American Financial Exchange (AFX) announced Sept. 22 that it is committed to being carbon neutral going forward by purchasing credits to offset its yearly emissions starting from January 1, 2020.

AFX already neutralized its historical emissions after calculating its carbon footprint from 2015 to 2021 in Scope 1 and 2 emissions and for 2020 in Scope 3 emissions.

The electronic lending exchange plans to calculate its current Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions with the help of the University of Chicago’s Climate Vault and then use those calculations to reduce or offset all its emissions. This will also make its market-based interest rate AMERIBOR the world’s first carbon-neutral interest rate benchmark.

Climate Vault will use its offset contributions to purchase CO2 permits on regulated cap-and-trade compliance markets and “vault” them, lowering the cap on CO2 emissions in those markets to generate a reduction. Climate Vault also invests in the development of carbon removal technologies.

“Today AFX and AMERIBOR have taken the important step of going carbon neutral,” Dr. Richard L. Sandor, chairman and CEO of AFX, said in a statement. “We want to send a message that we live up to our core values of “commercial logic with social value.” We intend to continue our commitment by continuously incorporating our Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions in future calculations; and improve and refine data collection and calculation of Scope 1, 2 and 3 since inception.”