Paris — Three climate activist groups on Thursday took legal action in a Paris court against BNP Paribas, alleging the bank’s loans to big oil and gas companies breach a legally binding duty in France to ensure its activities do not harm the environment.
Climate campaigners are increasingly using lawsuits to push big companies to speed up efforts to make the shift to a low-carbon economy. In 2021, Shell was ordered by a Dutch court to deepen its planned greenhouse gas emission cuts in a lawsuit filed by climate activists.
In France, no court has yet forced a company to change its ways on the basis of the 2017 law.
The three groups – Oxfam, Friends of the Earth and Notre Affaire à Tous – said the lawsuit against BNP Paribas is aimed at making the French bank stop and exit the financing of fossil fuels, in what they said was a world first against a commercial bank.
Alexandre Poidatz, advocacy officer at Oxfam France, said the bank “continues to write new blank cheques to the largest fossil fuel companies without setting any conditions for an oil-free, gas-free ecological transition.”
BNP Paribas said in a statement to Reuters it regretted the advocacy groups’ choice of litigation over dialogue and that it could not stop all fossil-fuel financing right away.
“We’re convinced that the ecological transition is the only viable path for the future of our economies,” the bank said.
FOSSIL FUELS
The three NGOs said their legal approach against BNP Paribas, the euro zone’s largest bank, was modeled on the case in the Netherlands in which Shell was ordered by a Dutch court to deepen planned cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Shell filed an appeal against the ruling last year.
Oxfam, Friends of the Earth and Notre Affaire à Tous said BNP Paribas was involved in funding eight European and North American oil and gas companies, which are involved in more than 200 new fossil fuel projects around the world.
The groups claim that while BNP Paribas does not directly finance these projects, its general extension of credit allows it to make climate-friendly claims, such as joining the Net Zero Banking Alliance, while continuing to support potentially damaging projects via its banking clients.
The three groups cited the latest edition of the “Banking on Climate Chaos” report from RainforestAction Network, which said that BNP Paribas ranks eighth among the international banks that have contributed the most to oil and gas production, with $142 billion worth of financing in fossil fuels between 2016 and 2021.
BNP Paribas’ outstanding loans for fossil fuels amounted to 23.7 billion euros at end of Sept. 2022, the bank said in a statement last month.
The bank also said it had stopped oil project financing in 2016. “A commitment has been made to reduce outstanding financing for oil extraction and production by 25% by 2025,” the bank said.
In TotalEnergies next Tuesday’s ruling will focus on a lawsuit by NGOs which alleges that the French energy company misled consumers about its efforts to fight climate change.
The legal claim concerns the company’s “reinvention” marketing campaign. Claimants say the campaign broke European consumer law by suggesting TotalEnergies can reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 whilst still producing more fossil fuels.
Other lawsuits have targeted Air France-KLM Dutch division and even the French state.
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