Green Energy
HSBC walking away from net zero isn’t a shock. It’s the system working as intended. Banks make billions from fossil fuels, tell us they’re green, then ditch the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA) the moment it gets even slightly inconvenient. And now Barclays have followed them out the door. Surprised? Not really.
The NZBA was launched in 2021 by the UN. Forty-three banks signed up at the start, including HSBC, promising to align their lending with the Paris Agreement’s goal of net zero by 2050. Back then, HSBC’s boss was talking about "industry-wide collaboration" being "essential." Now they’ve put out a bland statement saying they’ll just crack on with their own plan instead. Classic corporate speak – lots of words, zero accountability.
This isn’t just about HSBC. Six big US banks – JP Morgan, Citi, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs – quit earlier this year too, right after Trump came back. These are the same banks that pumped over $2 trillion into fossil fuels in the past decade. Net zero was never really their plan – just their PR.
Here’s the thing: we at Ecotricity have now cut ties with HSBC. We’ve moved our £600 million green economy turnover elsewhere. If they won’t back a real transition, then why would we back them?
And let’s not pretend this came out of nowhere. Just last month, ActionAid revealed that HSBC’s financing of fossil fuels and industrial agriculture between 2021 and 2023 helped cause an estimated £128 billion in climate damage. We’re talking deforestation, land grabs, the displacement of entire communities. Even gender-based violence linked to their financing. That’s the human cost of their balance sheet.
Barclays? No better. One of their own investors branded them "totally dishonest" for pretending to go green while quietly funnelling billions into fossil fuel expansion. A damning report, published by climate think tank InfluenceMa, stated that between 2020 and 2024 the UK’s four largest banks (HSBC, Barclays, Lloyds and NatWest) poured a staggering £119 billion into fossil fuels across 1,183 deals between 2020 and 2024 – more money for oil and gas than for green projects, every single year.
Scientists have been shouting about this for decades: new oil and gas fields are a dead end. Keep drilling and we lock in even more emissions. Yet here we are, in a climate crisis, with banks doubling down on fossil foolishness. And yes, Trump’s “drill baby drill” nonsense deserves a mention – but our banks here at home are no better.
Meanwhile, look at what’s happening in the real economy. Renewables generated more than half the UK’s electricity in 2024. More wind and solar farms are getting planning approval than ever. The green economy is building itself – but the banks are stuck in the past, chasing short-term fossil profits.
So what does HSBC leaving the alliance actually mean? It confirms what many of us suspected all along: net zero banking is dead. It was never more than window dressing – a way to keep campaigners quiet while the money kept flowing into oil, gas and coal.
But here’s the good news: we don’t have to play along. Where we bank, where we invest – it matters. Banks are powerful, but only because we give them our money to play with. Take it away, and the game changes.
The climate crisis is the fight of our lives. Banks are choosing to be part of the problem. The rest of us? We can choose to be part of the solution. Move your money. Back green energy. Don’t wait for HSBC or Barclays to grow a conscience – they won’t.
The green transition is happening with or without them. Better to be on the right side of history…:)
