Your banking choices matter more than you might think.
Did you know that switching banks can be a powerful climate action? If you think about it, where you keep your money determines what gets funded — fossil fuels and deforestation, or renewable energy and local food systems. Moving your money to more sustainable, impact-driven financial institutions is likely the most powerful climate move you can make.
Why It Matters
A 2025 Banking on Climate Chaos report found that the world’s 65 largest banks poured $7.9 trillion into fossil fuel between 2016 and 2024.
These are financed emissions – emissions that don’t come from the bank’s offices, but from the industries it lends to and from the carbon-intensive activities banks fund, such as fossil fuel extraction and high-emission industrial operations.
Going Green 🏦
When you move your checking or savings account to a so-called “green bank,” you redirect that capital.
Green banks avoid investing in fossil fuels and extractive industries and instead prioritize sectors like renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, and community development, among others.
Research by Project Drawdown illustrates just how powerful these choices can be:
- Moving $8,000—the median U.S. checking account balance—from a carbon-intensive bank to a climate-responsible bank could reduce your indirect emissions twice as much as adopting a vegetarian diet.
- Moving just $1000 is equivalent to the emissions from a cross-country flight.
🌎 Systemic Change from Your Kitchen Table
Concord has a tradition of civic engagement and environmental stewardship. Aligning where we bank with what we believe about climate, food systems, and community resilience is a logical next step.
Switching banks isn’t just a financial decision; it’s a systems decision.
And it’s one of the simplest climate actions you can take from your kitchen table.
💰 Take action and immediately lower your carbon footprint by choosing better banking.
Rank Your Bank: worst offender or fossil free?
- Use a tool like the one from Bank.Green to find out! Enter the name of a bank and a simple graphic lets you know if that bank is Green.
- Is your bank missing from the list? Find another online ranking tool or create your own fact-finding journey.
Discover and Recommend Hidden Gems
- Talk to your neighbors about where they bank and why. There might be local banks and credit unions to discover, which are doing the good work of investing in our neighborhood farms and directly supporting our community. These banks may not show up on internet lists.
- Let Cooler Concord know about your favorite Green Banking institution! We can include these “reader favorites” in the April newsletter.
Join the Green Banking Movement:Take the Third Act Pledge!
Third Act, founded by Bill McKibben, features a pledge campaign encouraging people to move their money away from banks that fund fossil fuels.
Learn more
If you’d like to know more about value-based banking, the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV) is a good place to start. Alliance members commit to ethical banking practices focused on people and the planet.