GOLD: Council finds gold has a role in the face of climate risks

LONDON, U.K. – The World Gold Council has released a new report, Gold and Climate Change: Current and future impacts, aimed at providing investors and stakeholders with greater clarity around both gold’s emission profile and the role that yellow metal can play as a long term climate risk mitigation asset. The WGC is confident the gold sector, and gold mining in particular, might decarbonize in line with the objectives of the Paris Accord. Key findings of the report include:

• Estimates of the emissions associated with both the production and consumption have been revised, and they broadly validate the WGC’s 2018 work. In addition, the findings confirm that gold's downstream uses have little material impact on gold's overall carbon footprint.
• There are substantial opportunities for gold mining to decarbonize. Specifically, there are compelling reasons to believe that energy and fuel use in gold mine production can transition towards net zero in a cost effective manner.
• Gold as an asset looks relatively robust in the context of climate related physical and transition risks, particularly when viewed in comparison to most other mainstream assets.
• Taken together, these findings suggest gold may have an additional role to play as a climate risk mitigation asset in long term investment strategies.

The full report is available for download here.