World Bank financed fossil fuel projects worth $15bn since Paris Agreement: Report

Since the Paris agreement was inked in 2015, the World Bank has financed fossil fuel related projects worth around $15 billion, a study has claimed.

Big Shift Global, a coalition of more than 50 NGOs, in its report ‘Investing in Climate Disaster: World Bank Group Finance for Fossil Fuels’, said that the global institution and its subsidiaries have been funding “upstream” oil and gas projects for several years.

The study, which was published on Thursday, claims that the bank’s direct involvement acted as a catalyst for other private entities to invest heavilyin high-carbon emission projects

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From 2018 to 2021, the World Bank reportedly used financial intermediaries in the form of banks or financial institutions, or sometimes private equity funds or commercial banks, for funding, it said.

The report said that these indirect funding streams were a “major loophole” in the bank’s climate policy.

“It’s pretty damning. The World Bank takes a leadership role, and in some cases can provide just a small amount of support that facilitates much bigger investments from elsewhere. They have huge amounts of leverage, and we have found many cases where that has been used unhelpfully, in climate terms,” Kat Kramer, author of the report, told the Guardian.

The study also claimed to have found World Bank’s involvement in helping with indirect funding for coal projects, despite ending direct funding in 2010.

However, a spokesperson of the World Bank refuted the claims made by the report highlighting that the institution had also invested heavily in green projects.

“We dispute the findings of the report. It makes inaccurate assumptions about the World Bank Group’s lending. In fiscal year 2022, the Bank Group delivered a record $31.7bn for climate-related investments, to help communities around the world respond to the climate crisis, and build a safer and cleaner future,” the spokesperson told the Guardian.

(With inputs from agencies)

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