Your path to net zero starts here.
What is Net Zero Banking
Net zero banking is a practice where banks align lending and investment activities with the goal of achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions. This effort is meant to reduce emissions and contribute to the mitigation of climate change through strategic financing and advocacy efforts by the bank and its partners.
Why Net Zero Banking Matters
According to Project Drawdown Off Site Link, big banks in the U.S. lend as much as 20-30% of their portfolio to carbon-intensive sectors driving climate change. Most people don’t know what their bank account is funding or that it may be a significant source of carbon emissions.
Reaching net zero emissions by 2050 globally has been identified as the way to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius and mitigate climate change’s worst impacts, according to The Paris Agreement Off Site Link.
How Sunrise Banks Implements its Commitment to Net Zero
Net Zero Banking Products
As part of our commitment to track and reduce carbon emissions, Sunrise Banks offers net zero deposit and financing options for business banking accounts. With the Net Zero Deposit Fund, deposits are directed toward net zero loan projects that reduce or avoid carbon emissions.
Net zero banking is designed to support our commitment to reach net zero emissions by 2050 in alignment with the Paris Climate Agreement. We are working to eliminate the potential for hidden emissions behind an organization’s bank account and actively reducing reported emissions.
Sunrise Banks uses the Green Bond Principles and the Green Loan Principles as guidelines for its net zero banking products.
Social Impact Affiliations and Reporting
At Sunrise Banks, we don’t just talk the talk—we walk the walk, and our social impact affiliations and reporting demonstrate that.
In 2009, Sunrise Banks became the first Certified B Corporation in Minnesota. In 2023, during our most recent recertification, we received a B Corp Impact score of 148.6, well above average. B Corporations are graded on their social impact in five categories: governance, workers, community, environment, and customers.
Since 2013, Sunrise Banks has been a member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) made up of 70+ mission-based banks worldwide. David Reiling, the bank’s CEO, chairs the GABV, which works to create sustainable economic, social and environmental development. It has launched initiatives like the Climate Change Commitment, which asks member banks to measure the carbon footprint of their financed emissions.
To align with our GABV Climate Change Commitment, Sunrise Banks has so far released two Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF) reports. The report outlines the bank’s financed and operational emissions using the PCAF global standard, which provides its members with the industry-standard methodology to measure the greenhouse gas emissions related to their lending activities.
Read the bank’s latest PCAF reportIn 2024, a group of seventeen leading banks from GABV, including Sunrise Banks, endorsed the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty initiative. The campaign is a global effort to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement by fostering international cooperation to accelerate a transition to clean energy for everyone, end the expansion of fossil fuels, and phase out existing production.
Frameworks your organization can use to measure emissions
GHG Protocol supplies the world’s most widely used greenhouse gas accounting standards. More than 9 out of 10 Fortune 500 companies reporting to the Carbon Disclosure Project Off Site Link (CDP) use GHG Protocol to measure and manage emissions.
Learn morePCAF enables financial institutions to assess and disclose greenhouse gas emissions associated with financial activities.
Learn moreArticles and other media about net zero banking
Read up on the impact of sustainable banking and how your bank account can help finance the transition to a net zero economy.
Why where you bank matters
- The Carbon Bankroll 2.0: From Awareness to Action – TopoFinance (2024)
- This could be your company’s number one source of emissions—and it may not even be on your list – Fast Company (2024)
- New Report Helps Companies Stop Bankrolling Climate Change – Sustainable Brands (2024)
- How Patagonia and Seventh Generation include banks in their climate action plans - GreenFin (2024)
- Companies that care about climate change, need to care about their banking – The Hill (2024)
- Companies are slowly realizing their banks are adding to their carbon emissions – GreenBiz (2023)
- Your Money Is Funding Fossil Fuels Without You Knowing It – Wired (2023)
- Your Bank Account Could be the Biggest Part of Your Carbon Footprint – Cool Davis (2023)
- Op-Ed: If you bank with the Big 4, your money has an alarming carbon footprint – Los Angeles Times (2023)
- Most consumers are willing to pay more for green finance products, but banks can’t differentiate them – Tearsheet (2023)
- 67% of Consumers Want Their Bank to be More Sustainable – The Fintech Times (2022)
- New report finds barriers to net-zero transition continue to hinder progress as business struggles to convert sustainability commitments into reality – Baker McKenzie (2022)
How organizations can use the Green Cash Action Guide to reduce emissions from cash deposits
How banks can support the net zero transition
- Managing financed emissions: How banks can support the net-zero transition – McKinsey & Company
- How banks use Big Tech’s deposits to fund the fossil fuel industry - Marketplace
- Comment: The world cannot afford banks to step back from their net-zero commitments - Reuters
- Taking Steps to Reduce the Carbon Footprint at a Bank – S&P Global
- Going Green – The climate change opportunity in banking – Cornerstone Advisors
- Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund: Clean Communities Investment Accelerator – EPA