US-based camera and social media company Snap has revealed its climate strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, purchase 100 percent renewable energy and remain carbon neutral after offsetting emissions dating back to its launch.
In the annual “Citizen Snap” report on social and environmental initiatives, the owner of the popular photo messaging app Snapchat explained its climate strategy. The move comes at a time when carbon emission debates have started to point fingers at the tech companies and the energy-intensive process of running powerful computer data servers.
With this step Snap could not only reduce costs in the long run but also appeal to its mostly young user base, who are passionate about addressing climate change, said Dom Perella, Snap’s deputy general counsel and chief compliance officer.
“They’re going to be living with the brunt of these impacts for many generations. Because it impacts our stakeholders, we want to make a difference,” Mr. Perella stated.
By 2025, Snap targets to reduce emissions generated from its business operations by 25 percent, in part by making its buildings more energy-efficient and purchasing renewable energy, Mr.Perella said.
Further, Snap aims to reduce emissions from business travel and from purchased goods and services by 35 percent “per unit of value” by shifting to climate-friendly travel options and pushing vendors to reduce their emissions.
The American company said it determined the reduction levels by working with the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi), a coalition by CDP, the UN Global Compact (UNGC), the World Resources Institute (WRI) and World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) that advises companies on reducing emissions to meet goals outlined by the Paris Agreement international treaty on climate change.
Snap also said that it is now carbon neutral, helped by investing in forestry projects across the world to offset its emissions. It also calculated its emissions dating back to Snapchat’s launch in 2011 and offset its emissions to become retroactively carbon neutral.
