PKO Bank Polski joins the Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF)

PKO Bank Polski, in line with the climate goals set out in its Strategy 2023-2025, continues on the path to climate neutrality. The Bank is reducing the level of carbon footprint generated by its operations and is taking steps to decarbonise its loan portfolio. The Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF) methodology will enable a harmonised approach to the assessment and disclosure of greenhouse gas emissions in the bank's loan portfolio.

- Measuring the carbon footprint of the loan portfolio is an essential first step for effective environmental risk management, which over time, if not properly addressed, will increasingly affect the materialisation of credit risk. It is important that, at the current stage of development of the environmental implementation processes, the banking sector adds significant value by using proven and consistent carbon measurement methods, becoming an important partner for our clients in going through the challenging energy transition path,

says Paweł Metrycki, Director of the Banking Risk Division at PKO Bank Polski.

- PKO Bank Polski aims to become a leader in ESG transformation financing. An important part of the implementation of our strategy is partnership and cooperation with organisations promoting standards that allow us to harmonise information relevant to ESG management. Obtaining comparable data on our ESG impacts will enable us to conduct analysis, set targets, report on actions and disclose progress. All this is crucial for us to achieve our business goals, which we associate with our environmental ambitions,

adds Małgorzata Darowska, Director of the ESG Sustainable Development Department at PKO Bank Polski.

PKO Bank Polski – leader in responsible transformation

PKO Bank Polski assesses the impact of ESG on banking risks, evaluates and controls them. Identifying risks makes it possible to support the financing of environmentally friendly projects and to eliminate financing of those with a negative environmental impact.

Since 2019, PKO Bank Polski has been counting the level of greenhouse gas emissions from its operations. In its 2023-2025 strategy, it has committed to achieving climate neutrality in Scopes 1 and 2 by 2030. The Bank is eliminating carbon-intensive energy sources, purchasing energy from RES, and taking measures to reduce energy consumption. 

Committed to reducing its carbon footprint, the bank is also taking steps to decarbonise its loan portfolio. It has already committed, as part of its ESG targets adopted in July 2021, to significantly reduce its exposure to the coal mining sector by 2030, while increasing the scale of transformation financing by at least 5 per cent year-on-year. The largest contributor to this is new lending to RES projects. 

Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials

Financial organisations from around the world affiliated to the PCAF have a single global standard for counting and reporting greenhouse gas emissions ensuring transparency and accountability. Based on this, they can disclose emissions from their financing and investment capital clients. The PCAF methodology assesses the greenhouse gas emissions associated with corporate loans, securities, mortgages or car loans. The PCAF methodology is used by many leading international banks, including Barclays, Morgan Stanley, Citi, Bank of America, Lloyds. PKO Bank Polski is the second bank from Poland to adopt PCAF.

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PKO Bank Polski is the undisputed leader of the Polish banking sector, and the value of its assets is PLN 473 billion. After three quarters of 2023, the net profit of the PKO Bank Polski group exceeded PLN 4.8 billion. The company serves 11.9 million customers. It is the basic provider of financial services for all customer segments, achieving the highest shares in the deposits, loans and individual investment funds market. Thanks to the development of digital tools, including the IKO application, which has been activated by customers over 7.7 million times, PKO Bank Polski is the most mobile bank in Poland.