Apple Pledges to Reach Climate Goals Without Costing You Extra!

(Reuters) – Apple will not charge more for efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in its widely used consumer technology products, its chief sustainability officer said on Wednesday at the Reuters NEXT conference in New York.

“We don’t consider the reward to take care of the work we do,” Apple vice president Lisa Jackson said in an interview with Reuters editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni.

Apple, which has a market capitalization of about $2.8 trillion, making it the world’s most valuable publicly traded company, wants to show a way forward that can be applied to other companies, Jackson said. According to Jackson, Apple CEO Tim Cook has set the tone.

“I want to make it so other companies can say this isn’t because they’re Apple,” said Jackson, referring to Cook’s directive. “It’s because they understand how to make clean energy and (recyclable) materials work in manufacturing chains and reduce emissions.”

Apple has been aggressive among major US companies in advocating for stricter public environmental policies. In September, it passed a California law requiring companies to report their greenhouse gas emissions, despite trade groups in the state opposing the idea, which recently became law.

Under Jackson, a former head of the US Environmental Protection Agency, Apple was also an early supporter of federal rules requiring companies to disclose emissions from their value chain.

Many other executives of major U.S. companies oppose the idea, which has yet to be finalized by securities regulators. Critics say it’s easier for a technology company like Apple to achieve such goals than companies in more energy-intensive industries.

In his speech on Wednesday, Jackson nodded to the challenges associated with finding out and reporting the details of the supply chain. “Even making windmills that generate renewable energy has a carbon footprint, so it has to be accounted for,” he said.

For the latest Apple Watch model, the company has reduced its carbon footprint by 78 percent, but not the emissions of each device by about 8 kilograms. “Right now we don’t have the capacity to take care of that,” which includes the environmental impact of transportation and logistics.

Jackson also said that Apple is working with smaller refining companies to recycle rare earths and other materials. “It’s a place where Apple can invest and then help scale and bring in (other) companies,” he said.

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