By Ken LaRoe, Climate First Bank
Central Florida continues to be at the epicenter of the climate crisis with unruly weather events, rising temperatures and sea levels, and other extremities threatening our future. In fact, 2023 was the warmest year ever recorded in history. The year was also pivotal in the fight against the climate crisis as more people, businesses and organizations demanded change and took measurable actions to draw down their footprint.
To save ourselves from a future of waste, deep pollution and an uninhabitable planet, we must make changes to our consumer-centric and wasteful behaviors and practices now. The future depends on our ability to work together for a more sustainable future.
Facing the climate crisis is daunting and as an individual, we find ourselves asking, “Can we really make a difference?” The answer is yes. The most impactful action someone can take to become more eco-friendly and sustainable is to put your money where your mouth is. Divesting from big organizations and banks that finance fossil fuels will have the most impact in the long term.
If we learned anything in 2023 from the arbitrary attempts to restrict Environmental, Social, and Governance-focused institutions from succeeding, it is that consumers are becoming more socially conscious and that frightens the big, dirty industries. A new Deloitte study found in 2023 that one in three consumers stopped purchasing certain brands and products because of ethical or sustainability-related concerns.
Additionally, one in 10 consumers have switched some or all of their personal financial investments to more ethical or sustainable investment options in the past year. Perhaps this is because in 2022, 60 of the world’s largest banks used their customers’ deposits to pour nearly $700 billion into fossil fuels.
To prevent further contributions to the climate crisis, these increasingly socially conscious consumers need to amplify their sustainability initiatives and the absolute easiest way to do this is to switch your bank account.
All self-serving purposes aside, switching to a sustainable bank is the biggest and easiest way to reduce the impact on the planet because your hard-earned dollars go toward combating the climate crisis and addressing social inequality, and takes away power from those doing harm with your dollars. Divesting from the ones that are keeping the world’s biggest polluters in business is the No. 1 way to enact impactful change.
At Climate First Bank, we redeploy our customers’ deposits into initiatives that do good for the planet and communities including renewable energy, affordable housing and education. In 2022 the bank invested $23 million into commercial and consumer solar programs, $18 million into health and well-being projects, $11 million into affordable housing and $7 million into youth education, and has expanded and grown these efforts since then.
Building a better tomorrow is a nonpartisan issue — you don’t have to be a Democrat or a Republican to want to pursue greener behaviors. Party affiliation has no impact on the ability to make conscious choices with money like renovating buildings with regenerative upgrades, for example.
The bottom line is that nothing matters if we don’t have a planet to live on. Social equity and financial wellness don’t mean anything if we’re doomed for a future on a dead planet. Actionable change must be taken in 2024 and every year after if we want to have a chance at saving ourselves and the lives we know.
Ken LaRoe created Climate First Bank in 2021 with a mission to drawdown atmospheric carbon dioxide by investing in and accelerating the clean energy transition. This opinion piece was originally published by the Orlando Sentinel, which is a media partner of The Invading Sea.
If you are interested in submitting an opinion piece to The Invading Sea, email Editor Nathan Crabbe at ncrabbe@fau.edu. Sign up for The Invading Sea newsletter by visiting here.
