(Bloomberg) -- A coalition of banks, asset managers and insurers overseeing a combined $36 trillion of assets have told some of the world’s biggest corporate polluters to make sure their targets for reducing CO2 emissions are based on science.

Credit Agricole SA, Pacific Investment Management Co. and UBS Group AG are among 317 financial firms that have written to over 1,000 companies urging them to set goals through the Science Based Targets initiative, a widely-endorsed program for screening climate plans. Companies to receive the letter, which include BASF SE, Qantas Airways Ltd. and Rio Tinto Group, are being asked to set emissions goals in line with the Paris agreement’s ambition of limiting global warming to 1.5C. 

With a growing number of banks and investors saying they consider climate change impacts when allocating capital, the credibility of companies’ emissions-cutting strategies could impact their access to new investments and loans. Many of the world’s biggest banks and asset managers have committed to eliminating emissions from their portfolios and lending books by 2050, and are now taking steps to make sure they can reach that target.The role of the finance sector in facilitating greenhouse gas pollution will be scrutinized at the COP27 United Nations climate summit in Egypt next month. The gathering in Sharm El Sheik comes toward the end of a year in which finance firms have been accused of backsliding on their net-zero commitments, as the physical damage caused by a warming planet is more clearly on display than ever.“The past few months of extreme weather have again shown us what a warming world does at 1.2 degrees,” Laurent Babikian, joint global director of capital markets at environmental nonprofit CDP, said in a statement. “It will get catastrophically worse unless we see an unprecedented reduction in GHG emissions. But this is simply unachievable unless the highest impact companies have ambitious targets for reducing all of their value chain emissions.”CDP, which is one of four institutions behind the Science-Based Targets initiative, coordinated the campaign. Now in it’s third year, the campaign contributed to 154 companies setting science-based targets after is 2020 campaign and 213 following last year’s initiative. Just under half of this year’s cohort of companies targeted are based in the Asia Pacific region, CDP said.

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