In July this year, Apple announced its commitment to be 100% carbon neutral for its supply chain and products by 2030. This week, during the launch of the iPhone 12, Apple's Vice President of Environment, Policy, and Social Initiatives explained how.
Apple’s environmental progress report provides clear information on several indicators, including total emissions. However, there is a lot of grey area on how the concept of net zero is defined, and what exactly a company needs to do to be "100% carbon neutral". As a consumer, how can one understand whether a company is making real commitments or “greenwashing”?
Which emissions is a company responsible for?
A company's emissions can be classified into three "scopes":
Scope 1 refers to direct emissions from company owned and controlled resources - for example, fuels and heating sources, use of company-owned vehicles, emissions from industrial processes, and fugitive emissions or leaks (e.g. refrigeration or air conditioning units).
Scope 2 refers to indirect emissions from the generation of purchased electricity, steam, heat, and cooling.
Scope 3 refers to all indirect emissions that are not included in scope 2 - this includes upstream and downstream emissions and is often difficult to track since a company could claim it has limited control.
Companies should address scope 1 and 2 emissions, and to the extent possible, scope 3 emissions. Apple makes an effort to address all three categories of emissions, but it is unclear to what extent. For example, Apple's sustainability report notes that it has secured commitments from 70 suppliers to use 100% renewable energy but does not clarify what percentage of total supply volume those 70 suppliers represent, or how it would ensure compliance with such a commitment.
Will the measures make a difference?
Carbon neutrality: Microsoft was the first company to announce a 2030 target, followed by Apple, Facebook, and Google. Amazon targets carbon neutrality by 2040 – 10 years after other major tech companies.
Energy efficiency: Energy efficiency is considered a "first fuel" and makes eminent economic sense for corporations since it reduces electricity consumption and reduces costs. For example, in 2019, energy efficiency measures in Apple’s buildings reduced electricity usage by 26.4 million kWh per annum.
Renewable energy: Direct procurement of renewable energy for electricity consumption through power purchase agreements (PPAs) is likely to have the greatest impact. In many cases, this is not feasible – for example, if electricity from renewable sources at a given location does not meet demand, companies enter into virtual PPAs. A virtual PPA represents payment for renewables by the company at a different location. The third option is the purchase of carbon credits to offset the impact of electricity sourced from non-renewable sources. While the purchase of carbon offsets is not, in itself, a bad thing, it is difficult to comment on the company’s commitment without understanding how the credits were sourced and the price paid. For example, carbon credits from renewable energy had the lowest average price of all sectors in 2019. Apple used 100% renewable energy for its corporate facilities (scope 1 and 2) in 2019, of which 12% was by building its own projects to source renewable energy; 4% was through equity investment in renewable energy projects; and 84% was through PPAs and virtual PPAs.
Waste: A third component of sustainability goals, which often receives less attention due to challenges in measurability and the lack of clearly developed metrics, is the amount of waste generated from the production process. For example, the use of rare metals, the generation of plastic waste, and the use of paper are all factors that contribute environmental externalities. Apple tries to source paper sustainably and uses 100% recycled rare earth metals and tin in the iPhone. While the report lists the positive actions, it does not outline all components used and present recycled components as a percentage of total materials used in production.
Is it enough?
This is a tricky question to answer. A majority of Apple’s actions fall in the category of avoidance, i.e. reducing emissions compared to a business as usual scenario. It also includes plans to invest in sequestration activities (i.e. removal of carbon dioxide from the environment) to account for future emissions.
The key challenge to achieving carbon neutrality – not just for Apple but for all companies and countries – is the need for a different approach towards business and the economy. It is obvious that doing what is economically sensible – creating captive power plants, increasing energy efficiency, reducing waste – is necessary. The question is, to what extent will companies and countries undertake actions that are costly?
Apple has made additional financial commitments to some actions – for example, sourcing renewable energy can be more expensive than purchasing power at the average grid price (although renewable energy has reached grid parity, or even become cheaper than traditional sources in some countries).
But it could have done more. There are easy wins – like increasing the lifespan of a phone through continued software updates so it does not hit technological obsolescence within 5 years. This is an intervention that would negatively impact sales by reducing replacement demand. Will companies take climate change seriously enough to consider such measures?
Who bears the cost?
A second question related question is – who bears the cost of sustainability interventions? The question of whether production-based emissions estimates correctly affix responsibility has remained a lively debate for many years. At the international level, countries argue that shifting manufacturing facilities to developing countries and attributing emissions to them while the products continue to be consumed by the developed world may is unfair. At the national level, shifting the onus of recycling or consuming sustainably on individuals seems to give a free pass to the corporations. There are no easy answers since this requires a balancing of fairness with incentives for sustainable behavior.
In Apple’s case, the lighting charger is an example of this challenge. After Apple's announcement earlier this year that chargers will no longer be included with the Apple Watch, it was widely expected that a similar move would follow for the iPhone. The question is – will Apple reduce the price of the iPhone considering that consumers will have to pay extra for accessories? If the purpose was to reduce waste, why not move to Type C chargers so that consumers do not need to have different cables for Apple devices?
Transparency
Many companies brand their products as “sustainable” and sell them at a markup to eco-conscious consumers without necessarily taking commensurate action to limit environmental externalities. I’m not suggesting that Apple is making an empty signal; rather that companies that wish to set themselves apart from those who are doing very little need to bring in greater transparency to their reporting. For example, suggesting that the removal of Apple chargers and earpods from the iPhone box is the equivalent of removing 450,000 cars from the road this year is a very confusing way to express impact because it involves so many assumptions. While Apple did refer to 2 million MtCO2e annually from the action, a more helpful way to reference these actions is to contextualize it against the company’s total emissions.
Can they do more?
Of course they can do more! Everyone can and has to do more if we are to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees. For example, investing in R&D to reduce dependence on Lithium – a relatively scarce metal that does not necessarily provide the highest efficiency is an urgent challenge.
Achieving carbon neutrality globally requires consideration of the long-term risks and impacts to the business if these climate actions are not undertaken and transparent disclosure of these risks.
Bottom line
While Apple has taken meaningful action, public scrutiny should focus on the actions companies did not take and demand greater transparency and accountability in order to achieve the level of ambition required.
If Graphene production is scaled for battery production it would certainly help. Having said that Apple has almost never worked on fundamental technologies. They are first to figure out the application and that is the biggest problem. They need to start spending more on fundamental science. If not directly, at least indirectly.
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We are in a society that celebrates ignorance and guarantees that people who lie through their teeth and right to your face get away with no consequences. So I have long given up following, believing or infact even just acknowledging the existence and the toxic bile regurgitated by non-experts.
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Thank you ponder woman! I hope your pondering is contagious and goes viral, cuz it's high time every individual started doing that. If not, only Darwin can save us! :)