Friday, March 29, 2024 | Ramadan 18, 1445 H
clear sky
weather
OMAN
25°C / 25°C
EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Amazon vows to be carbon neutral by 2040, buying 100,000 e-vans

1320189
1320189
minus
plus

WASHINGTON: Amazon.com Inc Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos on Thursday pledged to make the largest US e-commerce company net carbon neutral by 2040 and to buy 100,000 electric delivery vans from a start-up, as employees and consumers around the world plan protests to address climate change.


Cutting emissions is a challenging goal for Amazon, which delivers 10 billion items a year and has a massive transportation and data centre footprint. “We know we can do it and we know we have to do it,” Bezos said.


Bezos announced a number of actions at a press conference in Washington ahead of the upcoming Climate Week in New York, a global gathering of world and company leaders seeking ways to fight climate change. Global marches to push for climate action are planned for Friday.


Amazon is the first major corporation to announce such a goal by 2040, according to US non-profit group Ceres, which works with companies on sustainability commitments. “What Amazon has announced today is groundbreaking and potentially game-changing,” said Sue Reid, vice president of climate and energy at Ceres. “This will certainly have ripple effects because Amazon is so intertwined with the entire economy’’.


Bezos said Amazon will meet the goals of the Paris climate accord 10 years ahead of the accord’s schedule, and it will use 100 per cent renewable energy by 2030, up from 40 per cent today. The Trump administration said in June 2017 it was withdrawing from the Paris climate accord.


Environmental advocacy group Greenpeace USA welcomed the commitment, but a spokesman said the company still lags peers Google, Apple and Facebook in transparency around its renewable projects.


Amazon also pledged to buy 100,000 electric delivery vehicles from US vehicle design and manufacturing startup Rivian Automotive LLC.


Amazon and Ford Motor Co are among the investors in Rivian. Bezos said the first electric delivery vans for Amazon will be on the road by 2021, and all 100,000 will be deployed by 2024. A Rivian spokeswoman said 10,000 of the vehicles for Amazon will be on the road by late 2022.


The company said Amazon currently has 30,000 vehicles delivering customer orders in the United States. That excludes vans from United Parcel Service Inc and the US Postal Service, which are also carrying non-Amazon parcels.


Amazon will invest $100 million to restore forests and wetlands, said Bezos, adding the company will take a “careful look” at political campaign contributions it makes that could be going to politicians that deny climate science.


Amazon previously said it would order 20,000 delivery vans from Daimler AG. Bezos did not put a total dollar figure on the efforts to decarbonize but said many of the initiatives would save money. — Reuters


SHARE ARTICLE
arrow up
home icon