Earth Day: Global businesses unveil increased ambition and action
We Mean Business coalition
In the run to the Leaders Summit on Climate convened by U.S. President Joe Biden on Earth Day, businesses around the world have unveiled a swath of new climate commitments, underling the growing momentum from the private sector to help deliver the net-zero transition.
The Business Ambition for 1.5°C campaign has reached the milestone of over 500 companies. These companies are headquartered in 46 countries and span 48 sectors, including some of highest emitters such as air transportation, power, chemicals and mining️. The campaign has welcomed a host of new U.S. companies including Apple, Walmart and Twitter.
Companies with science-based targets are delivering real emissions reductions – they have cut their combined emissions by 25% since 2015.
Also this week, Amazon and Global Optimism have announced that more than 100 companies are now committed to The Climate Pledge, with over 50 new signatories signing up to the Pledge on April 21, including Colgate-Palmolive, PepsiCo and Visa.
Overall, the UN-convened Race to Zero campaign – which includes Business Ambition for 1.5°C and The Climate Pledge – has grown by 20% in the last month, now counting nearly 3,400 companies, cities, states, regions and universities. The US is the second-largest country for corporate climate action within the Race to Zero, with over 300 companies, while in the UK, almost a fifth of FTSE 100 companies, with a market capitalization of about 715 billion pounds ($987 billion), have committed. And the mobile sector is first to hit crucial ‘tipping point’ with over a third of the industry now “credibly committed” to 2050 net zero goals.
In other news, HP has pledged to become a carbon neutral and zero waste operation by 2025 while working with partners to deliver a net zero emission value chain by 2040.
In the transport sector, Volvo Trucks has announced it is aiming for half its European sales to be electric by the end of the decade as it outlined plans to boost its range of ZEV.
The transition to zero carbon energy is also ramping up with plans from Ikea to accelerate its investment in RE by spending an extra $4.8bn by the end of the decade to build wind and solar farms, while fitting its stores with EV charge points.
Amazon has also announced plans for nine new “utility-scale” wind and solar energy projects, making it the largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy globally with an electricity production capacity of 8.5 GW.
To help finance the transition, yesterday the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) launched which unites over 160 firms from across the finance system from new and existing initiatives, including the Net Zero Asset Managers and Asset Owners Alliances.