Bank of England occupied over its fossil fuel financing

A group of scientists has held the insurance and banking sector’s feet to the fire for continuing to finance the fossil fuel companies driving the climate crisis. Early on Wednesday 23 July, they occupied the lobby of the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), part of the Bank of England.

Scientists occupy the an arm of the Bank of England over is fossil fuel financing

Five scientists remained in the PRA’s lobby from 8am until 9am, during the morning arrival of employees:

They demanded capital requirements on fossil fuels in the insurance and banking sectors. Three more offered flyers to staff inviting them to an international network of financial regulators working for an end to fossil fuels expansion projects.

The scientists coincided the protest with the second to last week of the PRA’s public consultation on climate risk in insurance and banking. The PRA has paradoxically entitled this Enhancing banks’ and insurers’ approaches to managing climate-related risks.

The protestors argued that the PRA should be doing more to regulate these industries in a way that mitigates climate-related risks. In particular, it should do so by introducing capital requirements that would discourage providing financial and insurance support to the fossil fuel industry. In short, it should stop funding the very sector that is leading us ever deeper into climate catastrophe.

Capital requirements are the amount of liquid capital that must be held by a firm, reflective of the risk of their assets, in order to help protect the economy from collapse. Capital requirements on fossil fuels would deem these assets riskier and increase the mandatory amount to be held, thereby discouraging the holding of these assets.

Financing fossil fuel companies does not follow scientific consensus

The scientists taking part insist that climate and ecological breakdown must be central to discussions around mitigating economic breakdown. Allowing insurance and banking sectors to continue to insure and loan to fossil fuel companies does not follow scientific consensus or economic logic. Scientists held signs with calls to action, “Climate tipping points = economic risk. Stop new fossil fuels, capital requirements now” and “Ecosystem collapse is financial collapse, capital requirements for fossil fuels now”.

Signs also quoted Günther Thallinger, Allianz SE board chairman from his March 2025 article Climate, Risk, Insurance: The Future of Capitalism stating:

This is about saving the conditions under which markets, finance, and civilization itself can continue to operate…There is only one path forward… burning less carbon or capturing it at the point of combustion.

In its latest paper on climate risks in the financial sector, the PRA admitted that most banks and insurance companies are not properly analysing their climate related risks. It acknowledged that the industry requires work at a governance level to better understand climate risks including climate scenario analysis to fully capture future risks. A recent article in the Financial Times quoted senior Bank of England staff who resigned over the deprioritisation of climate and nature risks.

Capital requirements on fossil fuels is not as radical an idea as it may seem. The European Insurance Authority (EIOPA) recommended capital requirements on fossil fuels:

to accurately reflect the high risks of these assets

What’s more, the PRA mentions capital requirements in its consultation paper’s current iteration. However the PRA still states that it will impose no new capital requirements on top of what it requires now. This results in little financial incentive for banking and insurance firms to reduce their involvement in new oil and gas expansion projects. It therefore misses a vital opportunity to incentivise meaningful change in the financial sector.

Shana, a space engineer and occupier in the lobby, said:

Those that work in insurance and at the PRA, like us scientists, know how dire the situation is.

To talk about ‘managing climate-risk’ in regard to banking and insurance operations whilst ignoring the fact that these same firms are enabling new oil and gas projects is baffling. They’re advising companies on how to manage a crisis that these same companies are actively contributing to – it’s like giving fire safety training to the person lighting the flames. Instead of just managing risk we need to actively be mitigating risk – something the PRA can do through capital requirements on fossil fuels for banks and insurers.

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