It sounds simple,
just power your business
with 100 percent renewable energy.
But the detail that goes in
and the industry expertise that's required
to really understand not just how much
energy you're consuming
across different parts of your business,
but also what's the best
and most cost-effective way
to drive new wind and solar
to the grids around the world.
It's complicated, and not everybody
has the opportunity
to build an internal team
of energy experts.
It really comes back
to the opportunity to partner.
[In the Green: The Business
of Climate Action]
[Presented by TED Countdown
The Climate Pledge]
[Chris Roe; Company: Amazon;
Location: USA]
When you take a step back
and think about Amazon as a company,
it's a complicated place.
We operate data centers,
distribution centers, warehouses,
commercial offices, grocery stores,
and all of these different
types of operations
have a different set of challenges
that we're trying to tackle.
We set this goal to get to 100 percent
renewable energy by 2030.
We started off with questions like,
“How much energy did we use in India
last year, or last month, or yesterday?”
Understanding our usage across time
and across geographies,
and then mapping that
against where are the available solar
and wind projects that we
could possibly invest in
and then figure out
where can we be a catalyst
to really drive new clean energy
to the grids where we operate.
We realized very quickly
that we cannot go at this alone.
We needed to galvanize collective action
across the entire economy,
and that’s why we launched
The Climate Pledge
which is really just that,
it’s a pledge and a commitment
to get to net zero
in alignment with climate science,
but an invitation to partner
and a collective call to action
for other companies to take part
in this journey with us.
So when we set out our second headquarters
location in Arlington, Virginia,
we tried to think about how are we
going to power this new campus
with 100 percent renewable energy.
We got to know Arlington County
and realized they also had a commitment
to power their government buildings,
as well as the entire community,
with 100 percent
renewable energy over time.
So that instant partnership
allowed us to come together and say,
“What are some cool options
that we can explore together
to bring new renewable
energy to Arlington?”
We took a step back to evaluate
how much power will this campus consume?
How much power will our local
Whole Foods stores,
our distribution center stores consume?
We were able to add that all up
and then talk to the county
and ask them the exact same questions.
How much power do you need
to achieve your clean energy goals?
And so we combined those numbers
and really came to Dominion,
the local utility provider,
with the need of basically a 120-megawatt
solar farm [to] meet all of our needs.
We were able to strike an agreement
that would allow us to bring
that 120-megawatt solar farm online
that would eventually feed the grids
that feed government buildings,
Amazon stores,
as well as our new campus in Arlington.
When we started our journey,
we were at 42 percent
renewable energy in 2019.
And fast forward to today,
we're powered by 85 percent
renewable energy across the world.
We have a chance
to accelerate that commitment
to get to 100 percent renewable energy
from 2030 down to 2025.
We have more work to do,
but I think the proof points we have
with renewable energy
give us a blueprint on how we can attack
other parts of the climate crisis
yet to be solved.
How do we decarbonize concrete
in our buildings?
How do we think about aviation
from a zero-carbon perspective?
How do we know what our buildings consume,
how do we know where we need to get to
to hit our goals?
Amazon wants to get to net zero
because we don't have an option.
The climate science is clear.
We need partnerships
to drive change at scale
that's really going to drive carbon
out of our global economy.
And that was really the spirit
of The Climate Pledge
and a call to action
to solve the climate crisis.