Our money is fuelling climate change

Since the Paris Agreement in 2015, the world’s 65 biggest banks have committed US$7.9 trillion to the fossil fuel industry, writes Karol Balfe.

Residents inspect houses damaged during a flood in Malalak, West Sumatra, Indonesia, last November. Picture: Ade Yuandha/AP

Another year, another Cop summit. The dust has now settled on the latest Conference of the Parties, the annual climate change summit that serves as the core multilateral mechanism to try to keep the world within 1.5C of warming.

This task of limiting global warming to safe levels is a monumental one. Droughts, floods, record heatwaves, collapsing glaciers, and failing harvests are no longer exceptions, but the new normal. Scientists now warn there’s an 80% chance that at least one of the next five years will surpass 2024 as the hottest on record.