HSBC appoints Celine Herweijer as Group Chief Sustainability Officer

HSBC Holdings announces the appointment of Dr Celine Herweijer as Group Chief Sustainability Officer, effective July 2021 and reporting to Noel Quinn, HSBC, Group CEO.

She joins from PwC, where she has held roles including leading PwC’s Global Innovation and Sustainability capability, and acting as PwC’s Global Climate Change Leader.

As a partner in the UK firm, Celine has been at the forefront of PwC’s global work on sustainability and climate change for over a decade. In this role, she has advised corporate boards across different industries on net zero and wider sustainable business transformation.  

Celine has held numerous international advisory board and committee roles on sustainability including for the United Nations, World Economic Forum (where she is a WEF Young Global Leader), G20, the World Bank, the European Union and a number of governments. She is co-Chair of the We Mean Business Coalition and is also a trustee of BLUE Marine, a leading conservation NGO.

A climate scientist and NASA Fellow by training, Celine holds a PhD in Climate Modelling and Policy from Columbia University, NY, and is a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics.

At HSBC, Celine will work with and build on the achievements of the Sustainable Finance and Corporate Sustainability teams across the bank, as well as the HSBC Centre for Sustainable Finance, to further establish the bank’s global leadership on climate change. She will lead the ongoing development and delivery of the Group’s sustainability strategy, with a particular focus on the bank’s commitment to the global transition to net zero.