OPINION
As the heat dome takes lives, Canadian banks must acknowledge their role in climate change

By Ali Wines

Contributor
Fri., July 9, 2021


In the week before Canada Day, over 700 people in British Columbia died in Western Canada’s record-breaking heat wave — triple the number that would normally occur.

In the same period, 10 people in the province died from COVID-19.

Fewer people are being lost to COVID, because we listened to scientists. We saw a disastrous wave cresting and, globally, our full attention and resources were directed to stopping it, by trusting those with the knowledge and expertise to keep us safe. We wore masks, we kept our distance and, after a year of uncertainty, welcomed the astonishing solution of not one but four different vaccines.

We need to treat the climate crisis with the same level of determination as we have the pandemic. Because if this week has taught us nothing else, climate change is a public health emergency. A dire one, and we should be alarmed.

Historically, we have thought of climate change as something that will happen at a distant time in the future, something we can put off worrying about while we address more important issues. It’s seemed, also, to be something that happens, conveniently, somewhere else. The Arctic, or Pakistan, or a tiny Pacific island whose name we don’t know. Yet, here it is — searing our towns with temperatures of over 48 blistering degrees, buckling roads, causing power outages and, tragically, taking lives.


It should now be apparent to all of us that this isn’t something that means pleasantly warmer temperatures and slightly fewer polar bears: the climate crisis threatens our quality of life, and the lives of the most vulnerable Canadians.

The pandemic taught us that global solutions require the collaboration of governments, academia and the private sector. The climate emergency is no different: if we are to prevent disasters like the heat dome, we need to see a level of action from Canada’s corporations that goes well beyond current commitments. First and foremost must be our banks, who currently play an outsize role in funding climate change.


In 2016, Canada joined 197 countries around the world in signing the Paris Agreement. Since then, our Big Five banks have given over $500 billion to fossil fuel projects. That’s equivalent to $1.4 million dollars a day, for the last 1,000 years. Every one of Canada’s major banks is in the top 25 highest funders of fossil fuels globally. At the current rate of financing, it will not be possible to meet our commitments under the Paris Agreement, or halt catastrophic global warming.

Recently, the International Energy Agency (the body oil and gas companies rely on for lobbying and policy guidance) set out a time frame for ending fossil fuel dependence, if we are to keep global heating under the point-of-no-return mark of 1.5 degrees. This included a requirement that new coal, oil and gas projects cease being funded this year.

Canadian banks are lagging their global peers in the move to divest from fossil fuels. In April, 160 financial firms formed the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), spearheaded by Mark Carney, committing to reach net-zero emissions across lending portfolios by 2050. Not one Canadian bank joined.

The risk is not only an environmental and public health one, but an economic one also. As climate policy begins to outpace corporate action, banks risk sitting on billions of dollars of stranded assets that would decimate their bottom line and dramatically impact shareholder value. In fact, the Bank of Canada issued a warning that debt and equity prices for carbon-intensive industries “fail to adequately factor in the risks of climate change, leaving investors exposed to the potential of sudden losses in value.” Many industry experts have noted that the fossil fuel industry is in irreversible decline. TD’s own chief economist, Beata Caranci, recently told the New York Times that “this industry is not going to be turning around.”

That’s why Protect Our Winters (POW) Canada, a non-profit which unites the outdoor community in the fight against climate change, is calling on Canada’s banks to divest from fossil fuels. POW aims to highlight the importance of winter and a stable climate to the well-being of this country. Without a reliable snowpack, industries from tourism to agriculture to shipping face an uncertain future. This year, the Prairies received so little snow that farmers were planting into dust come spring.

While banks fund fossil fuels, they jeopardize the viability of industries that employ millions of Canadians and are critical to GDP. Divestment doesn’t mean abandoning energy workers. It means planning for a transition that supports the well-being — financial, social and physical — of all Canadians, while protecting the climate and wild spaces of this astonishingly beautiful country for future generations.

This year, we listened to the science, and it worked. As deadly heat waves continue to scorch the country, we are asking, will Canada’s Big Five banks take their heads out of the (oil) sand and divest from fossil fuels? Canadian lives are depending on it.

Ali Wines is a Toronto-based writer, communication adviser and a campaign lead for Protect Our Waters Canada.