Moody’s Sets New Sustainability Commitments
Information services and risk assessment firm Moody’s Corporation announced today new environmental sustainability targets for the company’s operations, covering goals for carbon neutrality, renewable energy use, and GHG emissions. Moody’s also announced that its GHG emissions targets were validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi).
Moody’s achieved carbon neutrality for the first time in 2019. The company has now committed to remaining carbon neutral on an annual basis by mitigating emissions, and purchasing verified carbon offsets for residual emissions from its operations, employee commuting and business travel. Additionally, the company has committed to retroactively offsetting its GHG emissions from September 2000, when Moody’s became a public company, to December 2018. Moody’s intends to complete this goal by 2040 through the purchase of verified carbon offsets.
Moody’s intends to significantly increase its usage of renewable energy, committing to procuring 100% renewable electricity for its global operations beginning in 2020, up from 11% in 2019. The company will increase its contracts with utility suppliers whose electricity originates from a renewable source where possible and will purchase unbundled renewable energy certificates. Moody’s noted that its offices in London, Frankfurt and Edinburgh already use 100% renewable electricity.
Moody’s announced that its GHG emissions targets have been validated by SBTi. The company is targeting net zero emissions by 2050, consistent with its commitment to the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) Business Ambition for 1.5°C.
SBTi was formed as a collaboration between CDP, World Resources Institute (WRI), the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), and the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), with the goal to establish science-based environmental target setting as a standard corporate practice. Achieving approval of targets by SBTi is a significant milestone for companies’ sustainability efforts, with many companies joining the initiative, but only 420 receiving approval globally to date.
Moody’s has set its GHG emissions targets as follows:
- reduce absolute scope 1 and scope 2 GHG emissions 50% by 2030 from a 2019 base year
- reduce absolute scope 3 GHG emissions from fuel and energy related activities, business travel and employee commuting 15% by 2025 from a 2019 base year, and
- 60% of its suppliers by spend covering purchased goods and services and capital goods to have science based targets by 2025.
Mark Kaye, Chief Financial Officer of Moody’s Corporation, said:
“Contributing to an environmentally sustainable global future is a key business objective for Moody’s. We are proud of the work we’ve done to enhance our environmental sustainability and will continue to expand and enhance our efforts to integrate best practices throughout our business, using science-based targets.”