Two and a half years ago, Klarna took a bold step to advance corporate climate action by pioneering a new model of climate finance that focuses on impact. Klarna implemented an internal carbon fee and became the first supporter of the Climate Transformation Fund (CTF). Managed by Milkywire, this charitable fund is focused on enabling companies to maximize climate impact rather than making offset claims and thereby aiming to offer a blueprint for how corporate climate contributions should be made.
Others are joining.
Since then, companies like Spotify, ING, Mentimeter, Pangaia and Avanza have joined Klarna and Milkywire in this pioneering effort, signaling the growing traction of our approach. In total over 8 million dollars have been allocated to projects selected for the fund 2021-2023, Klarna contributing over 5 of those millions.
Achievements so far.
What fills us with the most pride is the concrete, positive change that the fund has contributed to. In a new progress report released last week, Milkywire looks at the achievements of the projects supported so far. To date, the fund has extended its support to 30 high-impact projects across Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR), policy advocacy for decarbonization, and nature protection. We’ve funneled resources into groundbreaking decarbonization workstreams, from promoting clean energy in Indonesia to low-emission cement development across the world and stopping coal power plants in Bosnia. Within the nature workstream, we are empowering indigenous communities to safeguard their ancestral lands and assisting farmers in restoring trees on their land. And the CTF served as the inaugural customer for a range of nascent CDR initiatives, kickstarting their development and enabling first-of-a-kind facilities to be built.
The fund’s focus has always been on trying to maximize the expected climate impact in the long term per dollar spent. Since corporate climate funding is scarce, we believe we must be strategic about how it is spent, seeking opportunities where funds are most catalytic. This means not only choosing projects that are high quality, but ones that are in the greatest need of funds, and those that have a high potential future impact.
Klarna’s commitment to the CTF complements the other climate work we are doing on lowering our own emissions and inspiring our consumers to reduce their footprint.
So what’s next?
As we look ahead, Klarna is committed to continuing on the impact-first path, and we’re very optimistic about what can be achieved. We encourage other companies to follow our approach, implement an internal carbon fee and start supporting high-impact solutions outside of their value chain. Join us and our partners in raising corporate climate ambitions and helping reach global net zero.
Want to know more?
Read our Climate Transformation Fund progress report here.