Bank of Ceylon first State bank to be awarded Greenhouse Gas verification statement

Handing over of the ISO 14064-1 certification for the bank by The Sustainable Future Group Manager, Sustainability Assurance and Adversary Services Dr. Lakmini Senadeera to BOC Chief Financial Officer Russel Fonseka. Corporate and executive management members and the representatives of the Sustainability Unit of the bank and the CEO and other representatives of the Carbon Consultancy Company were also present 

The Bank of Ceylon has been awarded a third party Greenhouse Gas (GHG) verification statement by The Sustainable Future Group Ltd., after verifying that the bank’s scope 1 and 2 Greenhouse Gas emissions for the reporting period of 1 September 2017 to 31 August 2018 in accordance with ISO 14064-1:2006 were at a “reasonable level of assurance”.

A detailed technical review of the methodologies, approaches, and calculations used in BoC’s inventory estimates were conducted in this verification exercise. The GHG inventory includes scope 1 and 2 encompassing most of the direct and indirect emission sources covered by ISO 14064-1:2006. The 2018 GHG inventory verification focused primarily on scope 1 direct emissions from company owned vehicles, on-site fuel consumption, fugitive emissions and scope 2 emissions from purchased electricity.

Bank of Ceylon is the first Sri Lankan State bank to carry out an organisational green house gas assessment including its Head Office, province offices and all the branches. The bank in its special statement on this achievement said this demonstrates its willingness to promote sustainability efforts across its organisation. 

The inventory revealed that scope 1 GHG emissions of the bank were 2,902 tons of CO2 equivalent and scope 2 GHG emissions of the Bank were 10,354tonnes of CO2 equivalent. BoC’s overall emissions for the period of 1 September 2017-31 August 2018 is 13,256 tCO2e.

Scope 1 direct emissions account for 22% (2,902 tCO2e) of total emissions. The most significant emissions source from scope 1 comes from Fugitive Emissions, which account for 11% (1,387 tCO2e), followed by Company Owned Vehicles 9% (1,145 tCO2e) of total emissions. Total scope 2, Purchased Electricity emissions account for 78% (10,354 tCO2e) of total emissions. The GHG emission intensity was reported as 1.5 tCO2e per employee.

The Deputy General Manager (Finance and Planning) of the bank, commenting on this special achievement noted that this is another milestone in the bank’s journey towards injecting sustainability ethos into its core business via initiatives such as reducing its carbon footprint through responsible resource consumption including energy saving practices and steps taken towards practicing green building concept in constructing its branches, responsible waste disposal systems, moving in to solar power, reduction of paper use through the digitalisation via green banking channels and work flow automations through Document Management Systems(DMS).

To date, the bank has converted 41 of its branches to operate on solar energy. In its effort to reduce its carbon footprint, the bank has also taken a policy decision to construct all its new branches and relocate existing branches according to the Green Building concept, recycles paper waste professionally, and maintains its fleet of vehicles to ensure maximum fuel efficiency. With the view of further enhancing its energy efficiency, a sensor light installation project at Head Office and designating identified staff members as energy managers for each floor at the Head Office building are also being practiced. 

Propagating the use of Smart passbook, and e-statements, and encouraging use of automated, online and mobile banking channels are among the bank’s efforts to help customers migrate to paperless banking practices and in recent past bank has given major focus towards shifting its customers towards these green banking channels. 

Being recognised as the Best Banking Brand in the country by the Brand Finance Lanka, Strongest Bank by the Asian Banker and also being listed in the top 1000 world Banks, Bank of Ceylon operates a network of over 1,770 direct customer touch points across the country and also in Seychelles, Male and Chennai. The bank also operates a banking subsidiary in London.

With the Green House Gas verification statement in hand, the bank will continuously commit towards further streamlining and strengthening our environmental management systems, policies and procedures for better performance.