Last year, the International Energy Agency released the most comprehensive and groundbreaking study yet, outlining requirements to meet the Paris Agreement goal of keeping global warming below 1.5°C. It argued that if we are to meet those goals, there can be no development of new oil and gas fields and no new coal-fired power stations or coal mines.
Simply put, banks and insurance companies should not spend a single dollar more on expanding fossil fuel exploration and production globally – much less in the Amazon.
Yet, it continues to happen. Wall Street banks and insurance companies are the largest financial backers of corporations expanding their fossil fuel operations. Since 2015, six U.S. banks have loaned nearly $500 billion to the 100 corporations most aggressively expanding fossil fuel operations. Of those six banks, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup are known to be heavily financing Amazon destruction according to our research with Stand.earth. It’s time to hold them to account.
Our allies at Stop the Money Pipeline recently launched a campaign, Wall Street’s Moment of Truth: People or Fossil Fuels, to demand that CEOs, executives, and top decision-makers pass policies prohibiting support for any company that is continuing to ignore climate science and expand its fossil fuel operations. In this campaign you’ll be able to send letters to bank CEOs, join the Defund Climate Chaos Week of Arts Action, participate in digital actions, and more, all in the name of protecting our planet and holding financial institutions accountable. We’re going to need your voice to end Amazon crude and our dependence on fossil fuels everywhere.
In an effort to stop the money pipeline of Amazon crude, we launched the Exit Amazon Oil & Gas campaign in collaboration with Stand.earth. With your support and signatures we are targeting JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup to end Amazon oil and gas financing. Banks must act urgently because the Amazon, home to thousands of Indigenous peoples and critical to global climate regulation, is at its tipping point of ecological collapse. This financing and investment in oil and gas activity in the region is contributing to the destruction of the Amazon and our climate. Banks can’t continue to make empty “net zero” and carbon offsets pledges while destroying the world’s most critical ecosystems. Corporations must take the critical step of reducing emissions. The world is watching to see when banks will exit Amazon oil and gas.
Our Exit Amazon Oil & Gas campaign is uniting with Wall Street’s Moment of Truth to end fossil fuel financing and protect our planet. We have an opportunity to bring the rainforest to Wall Street. In this crucial time, we urge you to take action in every way possible over the next few months and beyond. Join us in demanding an end to fossil fuel extraction and call out banks for their complicity in destruction! It’s time to #ExitAmazonOilAndGas and #DefundClimateChaos globally!
