Sustainability
As the impacts of severe weather events are increasingly felt around the world, Fifth Third is committed to supporting the transition to a lower-carbon and more sustainable future. With a deep commitment to serving all of our customers, Fifth Third appreciates that banking is key to the development of new technologies, financing new infrastructure and helping customers make the decarbonization transition. We embrace our opportunity and responsibility to meet these growing needs.
To advance our commitment and address climate change impacts, Fifth Third is focused on three strategies:
Supporting a sustainable transition
by helping our customers and communities respond to a changing climate and succeed in a decarbonizing economy.
Managing climate-related risks
facing our company, including those related to physical and transition risks.
Reducing our environmental and carbon footprint
through projects that efficiently manage our operations.
Transition to a Sustainable Future
We have set an ambitious 10-year, $100 billion environmental and social finance target through 2030. The target demonstrates our financial commitment to accelerating the transition to a more sustainable and inclusive economy for all. As of Dec. 31, 2024, Fifth Third provided $45.3 billion in sustainable financing under the target.
Environmental categories for the $100 billion target include renewable energy, green buildings, energy efficiency, clean transportation, circular economy, pollution prevention and control, and other environmental categories.
Social categories include affordable housing, access to essential services, access to basic infrastructure, employment generation, food security and sustainable food systems and socioeconomic advancement and empowerment. Also included in the target are sustainability-linked loans and sustainability bonds.
Through Dividend Finance, a leading national provider of solar and sustainable home improvement financing, Fifth Third offers residential financial services and assists homeowners by promoting innovative energy efficiency, decarbonization and peak energy reduction by deploying, integrating and financing a wide range of distributed energy technologies. The technologies include smart thermostats, fuel-cells, smart electric panels, electric vehicle charges, solar PV and more.
Climate Risk Management
Fifth Third identified climate-related risk as an "emerging" risk in 2017. Since then, the Bank has updated its Enterprise Risk Management Framework to define climate risk for the Bank, and physical and transition risk was incorporated into each of our risk types.
Physical risks from a changing climate are already present and growing. These risks can be acute (event-driven) or chronic longer-term shifts in the environment. Transitioning to a lower-carbon economy may also present additional risks such as energy transition policies, disruptive technological advancements, including clean energy development storage, and shifts in consumer preferences.
The integration of climate risk into the framework was among the first tasks of the Bank’s newly appointed climate risk officer in 2021. The appointment underscored the Bank’s commitment to managing climate risk and helped ensure the development and maturation of the Bank’s climate risk identification and monitoring program.
Operational Sustainability
Operational sustainability, the reduction of our own environmental and carbon footprint, has been key to our environmental sustainability program since its inception in 2010. In addressing our own environmental impact, we better prepare our organization for future changes by reducing our exposure and risk to decarbonization, energy market volatility and potential carbon pricing scenarios.
Fifth Third is currently operating under six ambitious targets established in 2022 and to be achieved by 2030. Goals include purchasing 100% renewable power, a 40% reduction in energy use, 75% reduction in location-based GHG emissions, 75% waste diversion from landfills, 50% reduction in water use, and a 75% reduction in paper use. As of Dec. 31, 2024, we have achieved our renewable power and energy use reduction goals and are making significant progress on the remaining goals. See the Bank’s 2024 Sustainability Report for details.
Fifth Third completed 17 rooftop solar panel installations at new financial centers in 2024. In all, Fifth Third has more than 30 retail locations with rooftop solar generating up to 90% of annual electric needs at these locations. Fifth Third’s expansion of electric vehicle charging continued in 2024. To support employees that make the transition to electric vehicles, we offer EV charging stations at our Madisonville Operations Center and downtown headquarters in Cincinnati; our Grand Rapids-based corporate service center; and our corporate office in Rosemont, Chicago. We also installed EV charging at retail banking locations as part of our program to extend this amenity into the community, supporting customers and local residents. Additional charging stations are being added at select retail locations.
Additional Information:
Fifth Third Bank Investor Relations’ Sustainability Site
2024 Sustainability Report
2024 GRI Index
2024 SASB Index
2024 Stakeholder Capitalism Metrics
2024 GHG Verification Statement
2024 Environmental KPI Assurance Statement
2024 Operational Impact Data
2024 CDP Response
