Rebecca Kling, rebecca.kling@sierraclub.org
MINNEAPOLIS, MN - On March 18, the Sierra Club and partner organizations released their 2020 banks scorecard, Banking On Climate Change, ranking the top international financiers of fossil fuels. The report demonstrates that--despite the ongoing climate crisis--Wall Street continues to pour money into fossil fuel projects, including a number of projects in (or connected to) Minnesota.
“Like many rural Minnesotans, I get my electricity from a local distribution coop,” said Tom Thompson, a resident of St Louis County and an elected member of the North Star Chapter of the Sierra Club Executive Committee. “I’m a member-owner of Cooperative Power and Light, which buys its power from Great River Energy. It’s absurd that big banks like Chase and Wells Fargo continue to fund projects that contribute to climate change. Instead, they should support the heart of Minnesota: clean water, healthy forests, thriving wildlife. These companies should not be investing in fossil fuels that will damage the future of Minnesota, of our country, and of our planet.”
The 2020 banks scorecard found that 35 of the world’s largest banks have pumped $2.7 trillion into the fossil fuel sector since the Paris Agreement was signed, with financing on the rise each year. Fossil fuel funding is dominated by four U.S. banks: JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citi, and Bank of America. These same banks are propping up the fossil fuel industry in Minnesota and the Dakotas, funding projects that hurt our health and our planet, from dirty coal plants to fracked gas plants and tar sands oil pipelines.
New York based bank JP Morgan Chase stands out as the largest international funder of fossil fuel. With $269 billion in fossil fuel financing, Chase is the first bank to pass the mark of a quarter trillion in fossil financing since the Paris Climate Agreements. Chase Bank supports numerous fossil fuel projects related to Minnesota including:
- Financing or providing financial services to Great River Energy’s North Dakota coal power plants, Coal Creek & Spiritwood, both of which serve Minnesota customers through a network of 28 distribution cooperatives;
- Investing in and providing financial services for Otter Tail Corporation’s coal power plants in the Dakotas, Coyote & Big Stone, both of which send electricity to Minnesota;
- Investing in Xcel Energy, which has proposed the new Sherco fracked gas power plant;
- Investing in Minnesota Power’s parent company, Allete, which runs the Boswell coal-fired power plant and has proposed a new fracked gas plant, the Nemadji Trail Energy Center, in Superior, WI;
- JPMorgan Chase is one of several banks currently lending to four different active Enbridge pipeline-related loans, totaling approximately $6 billion. These pipelines carry some of the dirtiest energy, tar sands oil from Canada. Enbridge has a bad track record of spills and is currently proposing the controversial Line 3 pipeline expansion project running through treaty contested lands and the Mississippi River headwaters.
Sam Rosemark, student body president at the University of Minnesota, Morris, said of the report: “It doesn’t make sense that Wall Street is investing in dirty energy for Minnesota. They should be investing in renewables because they are the future: economically, coal isn’t the best option--renewables are cheaper--and coal is one of the dirtiest fuel sources out there. It’s bad for the environment and bad for our health. So on both sides, environmentally and economically, it doesn’t make sense for folks to be investing in coal. In Morris, a rural community in west-central Minnesota, we’re already working as a community to adapt to a changing climate, and these big banks need to get on board or get out of the way.”
The report revealed the truly global nature of fossil fuel investing. Nely Vela, in Peru, described the damage oil companies funded by Chase do by drilling in the Amazon rainforest. “The rainforest provides our sustenance. But if the [oil] companies come here, they will think they control our lands and will leave us with nothing. We will be the ones who feel the damage.”
While Chase is among the worst offenders listed in the report, numerous other financial institutions were shown to have a financial relationship to coal and gas projects in and around Minnesota, including Minnesota-based U.S. Bank. The other three major banks highlighted in the report - Wells Fargo, Citi, and Bank of America - all invest in Otter Tail Corporation, Xcel Energy, and Allete/Minnesota Power.
The full report can be found online at https://www.ran.org/bankingonclimatechange2020/. The core partners of Banking on Climate Change 2020 are Rainforest Action Network, BankTrack, Indigenous Environmental Network, Oil Change International, Reclaim Finance, and Sierra Club. This is the 11th edition of the Banking on Climate Change fossil fuel finance report.
More information about Minnesota-related aspects of the report can be found here.
About the Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3.5 million members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.