The climate clock is ticking.

The climate clock is ticking
The time for the EIB to truly become a Climate Bank is NOW!

Why now?

The European Investment Bank (EIB) - the lending arm of the EU - has recently adopted a new Roadmap to guide its transformation into the “EU Climate Bank”. While the Roadmap contains some positive elements, it falls short of ensuring that the Bank will deliver on its climate commitments and truly align with the Paris Agreement.

Building on a success story

The #FossilFreeEIB campaign is building on its 2019 victory, when the European Investment Bank adopted an energy policy ruling out support for most fossil fuels. The EIB also committed to align all its operations with the objectives of the Paris Agreement by the end of 2020. But the Roadmap it adopted in November 2020 is only a halfway step.

Not Yet a Climate Bank

Among the main issues with the new Roadmap is that there are still no clear requirements for EIB clients to adopt decarbonisation plans, so EIB funds may still come as blank cheques to polluters. The bank is set to continue supporting high-carbon projects like motorways and biomass. The EIB can support climaticide projects until the end of 2022.

Fast facts

Between 2016 and 2019, the bank provided € 4 billion in loans for the expansion of airports, € 10.65 billion for roads, highways and motorways and € 2.83 billion for the maritime sector.

Despite having ruled out direct investment for coal in 2013, the bank has since then provided € 4.7 billion to companies with a high share of coal in their portfolio.

Despite its fossil fuels ban, the EIB can still finance gas projects by the end of 2021

The EIB is the world’s largest multilateral lender, bigger than the World Bank

Based on the most recent UN Emissions Gap report, countries would need to reduce emissions by 7.6% a year (for the EU this would equal to emission reductions of more than 65% by 2030) to meet the 1.5°C target.

In the last five years, the EIB lent more than € 49 billion to the energy sector.

The latest report by the IPCC claims that if we don’t manage to contain global warming to 1.5°C, the consequences for our planet and our ecosystems will be disastrous.

The IEA says that to keep global warming below 1.5°C, there is now "no room to build anything that emits CO2 emissions”

Gas contributes significantly to climate change. Not only does it emit CO2 when it’s burned, but it also inevitably leaks in the form of methane - a dangerous greenhouse gas which is 34 to 86 times more potent than CO2