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Ideas for people
and planetTM
The RBC Climate Blueprint
Our strategy is to support our clients across sectors in the transition, while focusing first on the areas that we believe present the greatest opportunities and risks. We will continue to measure and track our progress and evolve our strategy to be responsive to the needs of our clients and communities.
Goal
To be the bank of choice for the transition to a low-carbon and resilient economy
Strategic priorities
Advise and finance client actions that support the transition
Actions:
Engage and support clients to help them succeed in the transition
Increase green and decarbonization financing
Engage with others in advancing climate solutions
Actions:
Help scale climate solutions through equity and community investments
Convene industry and share economic research and insights
Integrate climate considerations into our business and operations
Actions:
Advance climate risk management practices
Enable our employees to make informed climate-related business decisions
Reduce emissions in our operations and supply chain
Measuring progress
Our actions are underpinned with goals, initiatives and metrics that we report on in our annual sustainability reporting.
View our Sustainability ReportingBackground
The RBC Climate Blueprint is our climate strategy. It was originally published in 2019. This updated blueprint outlines the priorities and actions to support our goal to be the bank of choice for the transition to a low-carbon and resilient economy. It also reflects a clearer tie to the RBC Purpose Framework – Ideas for People and Planet™ (the Purpose Framework) which was introduced in 2023. We aim to deliver the blueprint’s priorities and actions further to the guiding principles described in the Purpose Framework.
RBC provides financing to support the growth of low-carbon energy, while also providing financing to meet current energy needs, including traditional sources of energy such as oil & gas. RBC is playing its role in helping our clients in the transition to a low-carbon economy, including supporting clients in high-emitting, hard-to-abate sectors in their efforts to decarbonize.
RBC’s climate strategy applies to all of its business segments and subsidiaries but does not apply to the investment advisory activities and recommendations of as well as the assets under management or administration by RBC Global Asset Management (RBC GAM) and RBC Wealth Management (RBC WM).1
Given the complex and evolving nature of climate measurement methodologies, data availability and data quality, it is acknowledged that certain climate-related metrics contain a high level of measurement uncertainty. Additionally, legislative and regulatory changes, market developments, shifts in public policy, industrial and technological advancements and/or consumer behaviour may impact our climate strategy. As a result, we intend to monitor and update our climate strategy to reflect such changes as we deem necessary.
View Key termsKey Terms
Climate solutions – technology, products, services or actions that help mitigate or adapt to the impacts of climate change. Solutions include those that support greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions and/or the low-carbon transition, but also those that support outcomes linked to society’s resilience to the physical impacts of climate change (e.g., adaptation of infrastructure, nature and/or biodiversity gains).
Decarbonization finance – refers to financing and other financial services in support of decarbonization activities that help to reduce emissions from high-emitting, hard-to-abate sectors. Refer to our sustainability reporting for details.
Green finance – refers to financing and other financial services that meet the criteria for classification as eligible green activities under the RBC Sustainable Finance Framework, including Dedicated Purpose financing/financial services (e.g., green loan or bond) and General Corporate Purpose – Pure Play financing/financial services (e.g., a business whose revenue aligns with the eligible green activities). Refer to the RBC Sustainable Finance Framework for details.
Low-carbon – an economy with minimal output of GHG emissions.
Resilient or resilience – capacity to anticipate, cope with, recover from, or adapt to shock, disruption, stress or changing factors in the external environment. In the context of climate, this refers to the resilience of the economy to the effects of climate change.
Transition – refers to the economic, energy, technological, and societal transformation that is required to achieve the significant GHG emissions reductions necessary for a low-carbon or net-zero world. This will impact all sectors, and is highly dependent on substantial GHG emissions reductions in high-emitting sectors.
For further details, please refer to our sustainability reporting (rbc.com/esgreporting).
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Our Impact
We’re helping to turn ideas into action by leveraging our business, operations, employees, community investment partners as well as our research and insights, to support the transition to a net-zero economy, equip people with the skills for a thriving future, and drive more equitable opportunities for prosperity.
ESG Reporting
We annually report on RBC’s focus areas, key performance indicators and progress in relation to environmental, social and governance matters. Read our most recent 2023 ESG Progress Report for more information.