Our Environmental Footprints

At Access Bank, we want to finance a bigger and stronger future. And as we do so, there is a reason we are very passionate about being conscientious stewards of the environment. It’s because we truly understand that the future of finance – on which our business thrives – hugely depends on ecological resources and natural capital. We understand that there can be no finance when there are no environmental resources to harness and transform. We do not just care about the environment, because of our business, we do so also because our people (shareholders, employees, customers and communities) all desire a future wherein nature and its resources are equally accessible to their children’s and grandchildren’s generations.
 
Environmental Considerations in Project Finance
At Access Bank, we understand that the projects and deals we finance impact local communities. These impacts may be felt in their water, rivers, soil, farmlands and even their air quality. As such, we adopted the Equator Principles for Project Finance in 2009. (These Principles help financial institutions to identify and manage environmental and social risks associated with projects to be financed). Since then, we have continued to adhere to the principles for our project finance. What this means is that a pre-condition to the bank’s involvement in any major developmental and infrastructure projects is that an adequate Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) first has to be conducted, with recommendations on how to manage the project’s environmental impacts.
 
To demonstrate our commitment to environmental considerations in project finance, we are also the first financial institution in Nigeria to deploy a customised Sustainable Finance toolkit that helps us screen projects and identify potential environmental consequences. We have also made efforts to expand our Environmental and Social Risk Management (ESRM) system. As such, we continue to set standards for the banking industry in Nigeria by applying our environmental focus on every lending process of the Bank.

Energy Efficiency
At Access Bank we are making energy efficiency part of our operating strategy and this approach has come to stay since the world realized that our global energy reserves are shrinking. Through our bank-wide shutdown policy; we stopped the use of diesel-powered generators beyond 9pm at the Head Office and 6pm for all branch offices. Even our procurement policy reflects our commitment to conserving nature’s resources through energy efficiency. Since 2010 until now, we’ve saved an average of 5 to 6 million KWh yearly both through our generator shut-down policy and our consumption of energy from the grid.
 
Access Bank has reduced its negative environmental impact by investing in environmental friendly technologies to power various ATM locations. Presently, the Bank has over 240 solar powered ATMs across Nigeria. The Bank also has a branch fully-powered by solar energy, with plans power more branches with solar energy. This will reduce our carbon emissions and in turn minimize our impact on the environment.
 
Emmissions
Greenhouse gases are the culprits of global warming and changing climates around the world. During the last 100 years, CO2 levels in the atmosphere have risen faster than in the previous 400,000 years. These man-made releases of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere are primarily from burning fossil fuels such as diesel, gasoline, coal and natural gas. In addition, deforestation is further making things worse by taking away trees which serve as sinks (or absorbers) of carbon dioxide.
 
At Access Bank we have embarked on several initiatives to manage and reduce our environmental footprint. These include the introduction of paperless work processes, reduction in paper usage through mandating double-sided printing, and reductions in our energy and fuel usage. In our efforts to neutralize our carbon emissions (experts call this “carbon neutrality”), we also embark on tree planting projects around the country. We have planted over 2800 trees through our employee volunteering scheme.
 
Our installation and use of video conferencing in our key offices and head office has greatly reduced our CO2 emissions by reducing travelling. We remain committed to employing more innovative steps to reduce our greenhouse emissions and help fight climate change.

Waste Management
We understand that wasting resources is not sustainable. That is why we initiated a mandatory paper-and-print saving initiative across all our offices to cut printing and paper use by 50%. Apart from reducing our paper use, we are also embedding water conservation in all our operations. We continuously make concerted efforts towards the optimal use of water throughout all our branches. This includes the reuse and recycling of water. To date, about 10% of the total volume of water we consume annually is reused or recycled. At the Head Office, this can be easily observed from the type of cisterns used in the rest rooms. These ensure optimal use of water and minimize waste.
 
In July 2016, Access Bank pioneered the waste recycling project for proper disposal and management of paper, plastic, glass and can waste at its Head Office and Annexes. Since its commencement, there has been a 50% reduction in the amount of waste produced that goes to landfill in these locations. We are looking to reduce our environmental pollution in the coming years; as such we are expanding the recycling initiative to our branches nationwide.