Commercial, GHG Emissions, Finance - March 4, 2025
Wells Fargo Shifts Sustainability Strategy
Wells Fargo changed its sustainability strategy and no longer seeks to reach net zero for financed emissions by 2050. The bank also announced it does not plan on achieving its 2030 interim financed emissions targets for various sectors, including the energy industry, according to a statement.
The bank previously announced in 2021 it planned to achieve net zero GHG emissions by 2050, including emissions related to its financing, and also set interim financed emissions reduction targets for industries such as aviation, automotive, power, oil and gas, and steel.
Wells Fargo announced it will maintain its 2030 sustainable finance goal, 2030 operational sustainability goals and 2050 goal for the bank's own operational emissions.
The bank's operational sustainability goals for 2030 include the following:
- Reducing GHG emissions (Scope 1 and 2) from 2019 levels by 70%
- Reducing energy usage from 2019 levels by 50%
- Reducing total waste stream from 2019 levels by 50%
- Reducing water usage from 2019 levels by 45%
- Meeting 100% of its annual purchased electricity consumption needs with new renewable sources
Wells Fargo also announced that in the energy sector, the bank financed conventional and low-carbon energy solutions. The company had approximately $55 billion of outstanding commitments to oil, gas, pipeline companies, and utilities and had provided over $20 billion of renewable tax equity since 2006 as of December 31, 2024.
The bank also deployed $178 billion of sustainable finance in three years, which includes $16 billion in renewable energy and over $15 billion in clean transportation finance.
"Wells Fargo can play a role in supporting our clients’ climate-related efforts. However, when we set our financed emissions goal and targets, we said that achieving them was dependent on many factors outside our control," according to its statement on climate goals and targets. "This included public policy, consumer behavior, and technology changes that would enable our clients to move quickly to lower-emitting operating models. Many of the conditions necessary to facilitate our clients’ transitions have not occurred."
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