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Climate change

Your pension’s more powerful than you think. We’ve moved £15bn of our investments to help combat climate change and plot a course to a net zero future. Together, we’re stronger.

Moving towards net zero

At The People’s Pension, we believe climate change to be the environmental, social and governance (ESG) risk with the greatest potential to impact the eventual size of our members’ pension pots.

We also believe that considering climate change when making investment decisions has the ability to help your savings grow over the long term, in addition to influencing changes in company behaviour.

Our ambition is to align our investments with the goal of keeping global warming below 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. 

“Asset owners like The People’s Pension are uniquely positioned to use our size and influence to ensure our members’ savings are allocated and managed responsibly, and that the companies in which we invest are acting in responsible and sustainable ways.” Asset owners like The People’s Pension are uniquely positioned to use our size and influence to ensure our members’ savings are allocated and managed responsibly, and that the companies in which we invest are acting in responsible and sustainable ways. Dan MikulskisChief Investment Officer

Our members can be confident that their savings are working towards a Net Zero target, because we have moved £15 billion of our assets under management into climate aware investment strategies.

A greener future for your money

In February 2024, we moved about £15bn (60% of our total investments) into ‘climate-aware index’ funds that will reduce their carbon intensity (how much carbon dioxide is produced per million pounds invested) by 30% and aim to reduce this by 7% per year in the future.

We believe this approach will allow our members to invest in a way that benefits from investing in companies that are transitioning to net zero and reduces the risk of investing in those that aren’t.

How does climate change affect your pension savings?

Our members’ pension savings are invested in companies around the world to benefit from their success in the future. Climate change poses several important risks to the success of these companies and, therefore, the value of our members’ pension savings. The future value of a company we invest in today may be affected positively or negatively by:

  • changes in the weather (physical risk)
  • shifting to a low-carbon economy (transition risk)
  • legal action being taken against those that have not done enough (liability risk).
Responsible investment

If you’d like to know more, you can read our climate change policies on our webpage about responsible investment.

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