Pension savers could make instant impact on reducing the carbon footprint

Money makes the world go round and often the most money any of us will have to our names is in our pensions, so where they are invested can be the most significant difference we can make to the world.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, for nearly half (47%) of British pension holders ensuring maximum financial potential from our pensions is most important. This is followed by ensuring their pension provider only invests in companies that seek to do good; ensuring their pension provider screens out companies who do harm from their investment strategy; and ensuring it is invested sustainably (22%, 20%, and 19%).

PensionBee, a leading online pension provider, has calculated that moving £1 trillion – the value of defined contribution pension funds for around 28 million UK savers – to ‘positive impact’ funds, could reduce the carbon footprint of UK pensions by up to 48 million tons – the equivalent of the annual output of 1,680 commercial aeroplanes or over 10 million cars.

Aston spoke to Becky O’Connor, director of public affairs at PensionBee.

Photo by Colin Watts on Unsplash