5th July 2022

GSK Pension Plans – Net zero target

Man in front of wind farm

GSK Pension Plans – Net zero target

The Trustees of the GSK pension plans expect to reduce carbon emissions associated with its investments fully (i.e. to net zero) by 2050.

This is expected to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels.

What does climate change have to do with pensions?

Negative (and potentially some positive) impacts on the pension plans may arise from an energy transition impacting equity markets and, in the longer term, from physical risks caused by further global heating.

The main focus for Trustees is to improve investment outcomes for our members by ensuring that financially relevant factors are not overlooked. In addition, we aim to minimise the possible harm done by our actions provided this can be done without compromising our duties as Trustees.

What are the Trustees doing about it?

We carried out detailed analysis to understand the risks and opportunities presented by climate change. We use this to inform our strategy and investment decisions.

We found the biggest risk to be the disruption and uncertainty that would come about should the goals of the Paris Agreement not be met.

The Paris Agreement

The primary goal of the Paris Agreement is a global average temperature rise of “well below 2 degrees Celsius and pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees relative to pre-industrial levels”. For reference, the estimated rise to 2021 is 1.1 degrees.

The full climate-related report

For further details of how your pension investments might affect and help mitigate the impact of climate change, please read our full report:

  1. Click on ‘Governance’
  2. Select your pension plan
  3. Under ‘Key Documents’, go to ‘climate-related reports’
  4. You can print or save the report if you want to

If you have any questions or comments, please contact us

‘Plans’ refer to GSK Pension Scheme, GSK Pension Fund, GW Contracted-Out Money Purchase Scheme and SmithKline Beecham Pension Plan