By taking more ambitious climate action, corporations can both help the planet and spur innovation.
As stated in the report Climate Change 2021 published by the IPCC, the human activity is changing the Earth’s climate in unprecedented, inevitable and irreversible ways. But hope remains and all governments and companies have a key role to play in investing in solutions to protect the planet and the economy.
All companies have work to do to further reduce their operations’ carbon footprint and carbon intensity. In addition to being the right thing to do, taking ambitious climate action can spur innovation that helps a business and its customers.
In such context, this article introduces 3 steps that companies might take to be more ambitious on climate – and ensure we reach the net-zero future we need. That is:
- Go public with your ambition.
- Decide where you’ll scale change.
- Tackle tomorrow’s technology today.
“Only together can we build a cleaner, more sustainable planet and deliver the low-carbon economy of the future.”
The main inputs and contributions are:
There are 3 key steps that companies can take to be more ambitious on climate and ensure reaching the net-zero future we need:
Go public with your ambition.
- If you have ambitious climate goals, you need accountability – and making your goals public is one of the best ways to get the accountability needed to drive change.
- In 2019, Amazon worked with Christiana Figueres, one of the architects of the Paris Agreement, to co-found The Climate Pledge. The pledge, which invites organizations to take urgent action, is a commitment to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 – 10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement.
- So far, more than 200 companies, including Best Buy, IBM, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, Salesforce, Unilever and Verizon, have signed the Climate Pledge. Signatories in total generate more than $1.8 trillion in global annual sales and have more than 7 million employees across 26 industries in 21countries, demonstrating the collective impact The Pledge can have in addressing climate change.
- By uniting to fight climate change, we send an important signal that it’s time to invest in the products and services pledge signatories will need to achieve net-zero carbon by 2040.
Decide where you’ll scale change.
- You can’t do everything, but you can start with the challenges where your company can have the greatest impact.
- One of the leading sectors driving up global carbon emissions is transportation. A quarter of global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions come from transport due to the high amount of fossil fuel consumed across the sector. If we do nothing, this could grow to a third by 2050, according to World Bank.
- Alternative transport solutions, along with efficiency and optimization, are essential in creating the low-carbon economy of the future.
Tackle tomorrow’s technology today.
- It’s not enough for companies to address today’s operations. In addition to reducing existing emissions, we need to ensure we don’t emit more later by thinking ahead and designing sustainable and zero-carbon technology for future use.
- While world governments must align on the dire need to address climate change, this challenge weighs on us all. Only together can we build a cleaner, more sustainable planet and deliver the low-carbon economy of the future.
“Businesses should also decide where they’ll scale change to have the greatest impact and invest in sustainable and zero-carbon technologies.”
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