Caring

At Norion Bank, caring means that we take responsibility for how our business is conducted, where a structured and transparent way of working is fundamental for good business ethics. As a bank, we have a responsibility to run a business that enables positive impacts. Our customers have different means for carrying out sustainability work and we therefore give great importance to supporting our customers in their transition.

Through our governing documents, such as our sustainability policy, code of conduct and environmental policy, we create conditions for our employees to appreciate how the organization should work in order to be a business partner that conducts business with consideration. We engage in continuous dialogue with our stakeholders to understand their Caring is also about reducing emissions from our own operations from our office buildings, purchases, and travel. We want our offices to be as environmentally smart as possible and our head office in Gothenburg is gold-classified according to the international environmental standard LEED“, and in Finland our office is BREEAM Excellent graded. In addition to this, the bank is involved in an initiative from the IT company Dustin called Takeback. Through Takeback, the Bank sends back IT products that are no longer used by our employees for resale or recycling in order to contribute to a circular economy.

The financial sector also needs to work together to create a sustainable transition and Norion Bank have therefore signed the UN's Principles for Responsible Banking (PRB). The principles set the framework for a sustainable banking system and help us conduct business with care. Through the initiative, we commit to align our business operations with the Paris Agreement and to contribute to the UN's sustainability goals. We evaluate our operations annually to identify areas for development. We have also signed the UN's Global Compact and undertake to conduct our business according to principles linked to working conditions, the environment, human rights, and anti-corruption. 

The bank’s climate calculations

In Norion Bank's work to contribute to a sustainable tomorrow, it is important to understand where our climate impact occurs.

The bank has therefore, in accordance with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHG) framework, gradually included more and more categories in our Co2 calculations to provide insights as to what measures we can take to reduce our climate impact.

The calculations of greenhouse gas emissions are reported as tonnes of Co2 equivalents. For the reporting year of 2024, the Bank conducted its first comprehensive calculations across all relevant Scope 3 categories. This inclusion of additional categories within scope 3 explains the significant increase in reported emissions from 2023 to 2024. This concerns in particular "purchased goods and services" where only purchases of technical equipment was included for 2023, but for 2024 includes all the bank's purchased goods and services.

The bank is continuously striving to move from cost-based emission factors towards supplier-specific emission factors to increase the reliability of the results over time.

Climate compensation

Norion Bank will be climate neutral in our own operations by 2025 at the latest. This comprises our emissions related to Scope 1 & 2. We may get to climate neutrality through climate compensation for emissions we are unable to fully eliminate.

Our choice of project was done with care, and for which several aspects of sustainability was considered. We also wished to support a project reflecting our operations as a bank, in how we can influence society in a positive way. The Gold Standard Siaya Cookstoves project thus became a natural choice for us regarding our climate compensation. The project provides micro loans to enable families in rural Kenya to invest in an efficient stove. The credits are given through savings and loan groups that are mainly run by women, which strengthens their position and influence in society. The living environment in their home is improved as the need to burn wood is reduced, for example in reducing respiratory problems for the families. In addition, the pressure on local forests is reduced when less wood is needed, which in turn contributes to reduced carbondioxide emissions.