Super-rich’s assets cause outsized amount of climate harm, study says
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- Greenpeace estimated the top 1% by wealth, through shareholdings and investments in carbon-intensive assets, control roughly a quarter of global annual emissions and cause nearly $1tn a year in climate damage — a figure the group calls the 'climate debt' of high net worth individuals.
- Ownership-based emissions from privately owned financial and physical assets account for 60% of global carbon output, and the top 1% are responsible for about 40% of that total, with the top 0.1% accounting for 17% and the top 0.01% for 9%.
- Clara Thompson, Greenpeace International's global lead campaigner on socioeconomic systems, argued climate policy has focused too heavily on consumers and that ownership of assets matters more than consumption, endorsing wealth taxes as a way to hold the ultra-wealthy accountable.
- The bottom half of the world by wealth accounts for just 3% of ownership-based emissions, a stark contrast to the top 1%'s 40% share.
- Big banks and financial investors poured $900bn into fossil fuels last year, according to separate data cited by the article, despite promises made five years ago to curb such financing.
- Thomas Piketty led a report published the prior week arguing the world could live equitably within planetary limits if excess wealth were taxed and workers retained a larger share of their labor's value.
- Cop31 pre-talks in Bonn, Germany brought together governments (excluding the US) for two weeks of negotiations ahead of November's UN climate summit, with 'just transition' arrangements for fossil-fuel workers expected to be a focal point.
Why it matters: Greenpeace's framing redirects the climate-policy spotlight from consumer behavior to the ownership structures behind carbon-intensive industries, giving campaigners and tax-reform advocates a new quantitative lever. With the top 1% causing roughly $1tn in annual climate damage while the bottom half produces just 3% of ownership-based emissions, the data makes a targeted wealth tax a politically specific — if still speculative — tool for Bonn and Cop31 negotiators to discuss.
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