The U.S. Treasury Department this week announced its “Principles for Net Zero Financing & Investment,” which pushes banks, insurance companies, and asset managers to unite behind U.N. climate goals.
This latest Biden administration initiative against the fossil fuel industry comes at a time when many state officials have been pushing back against the environmental, social and governance (ESG) agenda, including boycotts of ESG banks and fund managers, as well as potential antitrust actions from state attorneys general.
The principles, issued on Sept. 19, state that “Treasury and the Biden-Harris Administration welcome robust net-zero commitments made by financial institutions. Treasury hopes financial institutions will use the Principles to support the implementation of their commitments.”According to a statement by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, the principles “establish that financial institution net-zero commitments should be in line with limiting the increase in the global average temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius. They affirm that financial institutions that have made these commitments should develop transition plans with clear practices, targets, and metrics.”
These principles, which the Treasury Department says are “voluntary,” direct banks, insurance companies and asset managers to focus particularly on “Scope 3” greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Scope 3 entails those emissions from a company’s customers and clients. ritics have raised red flags about this new initiative, arguing that it is dangerous to push an industry, which is already consolidating around a few powerful players, to act in unison for political goals.
“The administration’s heavy-handed net zero guidance combines agency overreach with collusion between transnational financial giants, and appears intended to insulate our energy policy from any degree of accountability to the people or our elected representatives,” Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti told The Epoch Times. Mr. Skrmetti recently led a coalition of 22 state attorneys general, who penned a letter to members of the Net Zero Financial Service Providers Alliance (NZFSPA), one of several U.N.-sponsored net zero clubs.
The letter stated: “both federal and state law broadly prohibit business competitors from engaging in concerted action in restraint of trade or commerce. Accordingly, collective agreements to ‘restrict production, sales, or output’ are almost always illegal.”
Robert Bork, Jr., president of the Antitrust Education Project, also voiced his concerns.But some are skeptical that this move would benefit the environment.
“I think we have to remember what this is all about,” Utah State Treasurer Marlo Oaks told The Epoch Times.
“We're really talking about the free market system versus centralized planning, with climate as a pretext.
“I see this as another step in this administration's effort to undermine our economic system, to push financial institutions in the direction of centralized planning, and it is ultimately not about the climate,” Mr. Oaks said.
“If we are concerned about climate change, then we we should be promoting our free market system, because that's where innovation comes from, that's where we solve problems.”
In addition, despite claims that climate change is making the earth more dangerous, data shows that natural disasters like hurricanes, wildfires, droughts and tornados are not getting worse, although property damages may be increasing in nominal terms because more expensive properties exist today in vulnerable areas like coastlines. Deaths from extreme weather are also steadily declining and are down more than 90 percent from a century ago.
“This is yet another attempt by the Biden administration to use command-and-control central planning tactics to implement the Green New Deal policies that have been repeatedly rebuked by Congress,” he stated.“This announcement from the Department of the Treasury forcing financial institutions to adopt net-zero principles should come as no surprise to American consumers as the Biden administration openly declares war on consumers,” Will Hild, executive director of Consumers’ Research, stated.
“Treasury Secretary Yellen, with her announcement of these new net-zero principals at the Bloom Transition Finance Action Forum, has made it abundantly clear that the Treasury Department is working with and for ESG activists like Michael Bloomberg to make the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) goals for financial institutions into U.S. government policy.”
Ultimately, the goals of the net zero movement, if they are met, will likely entail a significant reduction in Americans’ living standards, critics say.
“It’s sad that when consumers are facing skyrocketing gas and electricity prices, this administration’s solution is to double-down on the failed policies that have driven the rampant inflation of recent years,” Mr. Moore said.