Loan for coal-fired power plant Mizuho Financial Group April 15 18:08
While reducing greenhouse gas emissions has become an international issue, Mizuho Financial Group, a major financial group, has decided not to provide loans to coal-fired power plants. Other major financial groups have the same policy, and the financial community is rushing to shift to an environmentally friendly attitude.
Mizuho Financial Group announced that it will not provide new loans to domestic and overseas coal-fired power generation business from June this year. So far, coal-fired power generation has low carbon dioxide emissions, and we have targeted loans for businesses with high power generation efficiency, but we will cancel it uniformly.
The loan balance for the coal-fired power generation business is about 300 billion yen at the end of last month, but we aim to reduce it to 20 by 2050.
While the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions has become an international issue, triggered by the international framework for the measures against global warming, such as the Paris Agreement, the movement to stop lending to coal-fired power generation is being promoted by overseas financial institutions. Since the beginning, environmental groups and others have made a tough call to Japanese financial institutions that continue to lend.
Mizuho's aim is to clearly show that it will shift to an environmentally friendly attitude in line with the trends of the world.
In a major financial group, Mitsubishi UFJ decided last year not to provide a new loan to the coal-fired power generation business, and Sumitomo Mitsui has established a similar policy and is urgently changing its stance.