CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background and Motivations 1.1.1 Environmental issues in business 1.1.2 Environmental issues and banks--environmental risks 1.1.3 Environmental risks and Australian banks 1.1.4 Australian banks' commitments and practices to integrate environmental risks into their lending businesses 1.1.5 Associations between environmental risks and bank loan covenants, and the cost of bank loans 1.2 Statement of the Research Problem and Research Purpose 1.3 heoretical Perspective and Research Methodology 1.4 Definitions for Key Terms 1.5 Contributions 1.6 Delimitations of the Research Scope 1.7 Outline of the BookCHAPTER 2 COMMERCIAL BANKS' ENVIRONMENTAL RISK MANAGEMENT (ERM) 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Environmental Risks from Banks' Perspective 2.2.1 Interpretations of environmental risks 2.2.2 Determinants of environmental risks facing banks in lending 2.3 Environmental Initiatives of Banks 2.3.1 United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative ( UNEP FI) 2.3.2 Equator Principles 2.4 Environmental Risk Management (ERM) of Banks 2.4.1 Concepts and procedures of banks' ERM 2.4.2 Integration of ERM into banks' credit processes 2.5 Covenants in Bank Loan Agreements 2.5.1 Classifications of bank loan covenants 2.5.2 Functions of bank loan covenants 2.6 Environmental Covenants 2.6.1 Environmental covenants for loans from multilateral development banks 2.6.2 Environmental covenants for loans from commercial banks 2.7 Environmental Risks and the Cost of Bank Loans 2.7.1 Determinants of the cost of bank loans 2.7.2 Association between environmental risks and the cost of bank loans 2.8 Conceptual Framework Based on Previous Literature 2.9 CHAPTER SummaryCHAPTER 3 ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS, BANK LOAN COVENANTS AND THE COST OF BANK LOANS--THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK PERSPECTVIE 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Agency Theory 3.3 Application of Agency Theory to Environmental Risks 3.4 Environmental Risks and Bank Loan Covenants 3.4.1 Environmental covenants in bank loan agreements 3.4.2 Customised environmental covenants 3.5 Environmental Risks and the Cost of Bank Loans 3.6CHAPTER SummaryCHAPTER 4 RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Research Paradigms and the Research Methodology Adopted ~ 4.2.1 Introduction of research paradigms 4.2.2 Phenomenological paradigm underlying this study and the research methodology adopted 4.3 Qualitative Data Collection 4.3.1 Sampling methods and strategies 4.3.2 Qualitative data collection methods 4.3.3 Data collection procedures 4.3.4 Data administration and ethics 4.4 Qualitative Data Analysis Methods 4.4.1 Justification for manual data analysis 4.4.2 On-going qualitative data analysis throughout this study 4.5CHAPTER SummaryCHAPTER 5 DATA ANALYSIS RESULTS 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Corporate Lending 5.2.1 General information on corporate lending 5.2.2 The corporate credit process 5.3 Environmental Risks in Banks' Corporate Lending 5.3.1 Definition and dimensions of environmental risks 5.3.2 Attributes of environmental risks 5.3.3 Determinants of banks' exposure to environmental risks 5.4 ERM in the Corporate Credit Process 5.4.1 Preliminary environmental analysis 5.4.2 Environmental risk evaluation 5.4.3 Environmental risk control and monitoring 5.4.4 Environmental risks and the cost of bank loans 5.4.5 Summary of ERM in the corporate credit process 5.5 Evolution of Environmental Sustainability in Banks' Corporate Lending 5.5.1 Application of the Equator Principles 5.5.2 ERM being ' business as usual 5.6 Environmental Sustainability Transformation in Major Australian Banks' Corporate Lending 5.6.1 Environmental sustainability transformation of banks' corporate lending 5.6.2 Major Australian banks in the environmental sustainability transformation process 5.7 CHAPTER SummaryCHAPTER 6 DISCUSSION, CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS 6.1 Introduction 6.2 Discussion of the Results 6.2.1 Environmental risks in banks' corporate credit processes 6.2.2 RQ1 : How are environmental risks in corporate lending associated with bank loan covenants? 6.2.3 RQ2 : How are environmental risks in corporate lending associated with the cost of bank loans? 6.2.4 Conceptual framework based on the results 6.3 Implications for Practice 6.4 Limitations 6.5 Directions for Future ResearchREFERENCESAPPENDICIES Appendix 1 Love Canal Disaster Appendix 2 Equator Principles June 2013 Appendix 3 Specimen Environmental Undertakings and Covenants in Term Loan Facility Letters (Case 1999) Appendix 4 The Value of Environmental Covenants in Bank Loan Agreements Appendix 5 Consent Form Appendix 6 Cover Letter Appendix 7 Interview Checklist 1 Appendix 8 Interview Checklist 2ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS