Barclays adds two more sub-sectors to align financing to the Paris Agreement

Barclays has announced that it is extending the coverage of BlueTrack to include two new sub-sectors, Cement and Metals (Steel and Aluminium).

BlueTrack is Barclays’ methodology which measures and tracks financed emissions across different sectors. When Barclays unveiled BlueTrack in November 2020, it announced it would start by using it to assess the two most carbon intensive sectors, Energy and Power, with more sectors to follow. Today’s announcement delivers on that commitment to add progressively more sectors to BlueTrack’s coverage.

Commenting on the extension of BlueTrack’s coverage, Sasha Wiggins, Group Head of Public Policy & Corporate Responsibility said: “We are on a clear, deliverable path to operationalise our commitment to align our entire portfolio to the goals of the Paris Agreement, on the way to becoming a net zero bank by 2050. We are fully focused on execution and today’s announcement shows that we are making steady progress.”

In March 2020 Barclays announced its commitment to align all of its financing to the goals of the Paris Agreement, and set an ambition to become a net zero bank by 2050. Barclays developed BlueTrack to measure financed emissions and track them over time against a decreasing ‘carbon limit’. Over time, BlueTrack will extend to cover Barclays’ entire financing portfolio.

Barclays has chosen to extend BlueTrack to Cement and Metals based on criteria including the magnitude of emissions, the financing that Barclays currently provides to each sector, the feasibility of emissions reduction using existing technology, and the availability of emissions data. Both sub-sectors are responsible for relatively high levels of carbon emissions, and both have sufficiently developed transition pathways and associated data disclosures.

Before the end of this year, Barclays will select appropriate benchmarks for each, defining how financed emissions will need to change over time in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement. Barclays will then measure performance against those benchmarks, determining how the emissions that its clients produce should be linked to the financing it provides, and then aggregating those measurements into a portfolio-level metric which will be published on its climate dashboard. Barclays will publish reduction targets for both Cement and Metals in its 2021 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Report.