Carbon Neutrality Storms Consulting & Automotive Industries
Today more than ever, the true value of sustainable action is being understood by businesses and citizens alike. With increasing governmental support around the world, most recently in the United States, corporations are taking the initiative, committing to a greener and safer future for all. In this article, we’ll take a look at several major corporations who have recently pledged or achieved carbon neutrality, particularly within the professional services and automotive industries.
Ernst & Young
First initiated by Bain & Company in 2012, carbon neutrality has been slowly gaining traction across the consulting and client services industries, with most major firms now researching their options. In early 2020, EY announced its intentions to be fully carbon neutral by the end of the year, the first Big 4 firm to do so. In December, EY successfully achieved this goal, simultaneously implementing mitigation strategies to lower its footprint as much as 35% by 2025 and purchasing offsets to counter balance its existing emissions. Striving to go further, EY more recently published its intentions to be carbon negative by the end of 2021, and to achieve net-zero emissions in 2025.
Marsh & McLennan Companies
Marsh & McLennan Companies is a key player within the consulting space and beyond, controlling the likes of Mercer and Oliver Wyman, along with major insurance firm Marsh and Guy Carpenter. In January, Marsh & McLennan announced intentions to be carbon neutral by the end of 2021, and to reduce its operational emissions 15% by 2025. With a strong belief in responsible capitalism, Marsh & McLennan has stated that “these climate initiatives represent a tangible step toward building a more sustainable environment for our colleagues, clients, shareholders, and future generations.”
Nissan
After EY announced its intentions for carbon neutrality in 2020, its major competitors -- Deloitte, PwC, and KPMG -- soon followed suit, announcing neutrality or net zero goals to be achieved in the coming years. A similar trend is now catching on in the automotive space. On January 27th, Nissan announced its intentions to be carbon neutral across all operations and products by the year 2050. While a much longer time horizon compared to other firms’ commitments, the automotive industry is one of the most emitting, given the downstream impact from customer use -- namely, fuel burning. To counteract this factor, Nissan further stated that all new vehicle offerings would be entirely electric starting in the early 2030s.
General Motors
Less than 24 hours after Nissan, General Motors announced its own carbon neutrality pledge on January 28th. In the spirit of responsible capitalism (and of course, competition), General Motors stated that its intentions were to be neutral across supply chains by 2040, furthering this commitment by signing the Business Pledge for 1.5℃. Additionally, GM has matched Nissan’s electric offering intentions, working with the Environmental Defense Fund to “eliminate tailpipe emissions from new light-duty vehicles by 2035.”
The business case for carbon neutrality has become increasingly clear -- hastened by competitors, corporations are committing to our planet right and left. For those looking to protect the environment and gain a competitive advantage, we highly encourage exploring the Software & Professional Services Carbon Neutrality Pledge because we believe that a sizable impact can only be achieved when there is commitment and collaboration across value chains, competitors, customers, and other key stakeholders.
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About RyeStrategy
Based in Seattle, RyeStrategy is a CDP-accredited, mission-oriented company specialized in carbon accounting, mitigation coaching, and climate disclosure solutions for organizations at any point in their sustainability journey. Learn how RyeStrategy helped Salesforce, Ideascale, and Wazoku achieve their sustainability goals.
From exhaustive carbon footprinting and mitigation coaching, to setting science-based targets and reporting climate data to CDP, SBTi or custom reporting platforms, RyeStrategy acts as a hands-on extension of the team, custom-tailoring services to fulfill climate disclosure requirements easily and accurately.
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