David Attenborough has reaffirmed, at the age of 94, that he is one of our most cherished personalities, breaking the record for the fastest time to reach one million followers on his recent debut on Instagram (overtaking Jennifer Anniston with an impressive four hours and 44 minutes). In doing so, we learnt not only just how revered he is as a naturalist around the world, but it also confirmed that the concern among the public over the climate crisis remains at the forefront of minds, even in the time of a health pandemic. It has been suggested that this period has in fact only served to heighten the commitment towards it, highlighting the inter-connectedness of our world and providing an opportunity for people to engage with the world around them more deeply.

Attenborough noted in the first video uploaded to his profile that ‘saving our planet is now a communications challenge’, in explaining why he was turning to social media for the first time in an attempt to reach a younger, global audience, the sector of the population that he argues are in the best position to drive change. The statistics back up this decision. According to Statista, about 70 per cent of Instagram’s worldwide users are younger than 35 and more than a third are younger than 25. The speed with which they have followed the naturalist shows this is an issue that younger people are engaging with.

The shift towards a more sustainable behaviour among consumers has had an impact on the business world, with sales of new electric cars overtaking diesel for the first time in September, according to figures released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. The commitment to more sustainable practices has been much in evidence in corporate announcements over the past decade. Some led the way, such as Patagonia, which put protecting the planet at the core of its brand back in 1973, and Sony, which released the first commercial lithium-ion battery in 1991, enabling a revolutionary shift in portable power storage. More recently it has become more common place - AXA became the first major insurance company to begin withdrawing from coal assets in 2015, and in 2017 Google became the world’s largest corporate buyer of renewable power. Earlier this year, Microsoft became the largest company in the world to pledge to reverse its lifetime CO2 emissions over the next thirty years.

Some in the financial sector though are arguably playing catch up with public sentiment, having been dragging their feet to date, but now acknowledging the case that cutting carbon makes business sense. Last week, JP Morgan Chase announced that it would be shifting its financing portfolio away from fossil fuels, following years of pressure from shareholders and activists on the company that has been the world’s biggest lender to the fossil fuel industry. The bank called for its clients in the oil and gas, electric power and automotive sectors to reduce emissions by 2030 and committed to cutting its exposure to companies that do not align their operations with the Paris climate accord. Last year, a group of 38 banks, mainly European, including Santander and Société Générale, announced their intent to cut emissions linked to portfolios. BlackRock also said in January of this year that it would put climate risk at the centre of its investment strategy, adding in their statement that “our investment conviction is that sustainability and climate-integrated portfolios can provide better risk-adjusted returns to investors”.

We will have to wait to see whether, as Larry Fink said, ‘we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance’, based around the defining factor of the climate emergency – and whether Attenborough’s army of followers drive further change, and ESG will truly become engrained in the operations of every investment house or if a leopard can never really change its spots.