All you have to do to realize the impact of global warming is turn on the news, or scroll through some YouTube videos about rising tides, sinkholes, and the epic battles currently being waged between fresh and saltwater sources and sea level communities. Global warming is not something we can deny, when the evidence of it is all around us, threatening the homes and livelihoods of millions of people across the globe.
Compared to other nations, the benchmarks set to reduce emissions or greenhouse gases (responsible for global warming) in the United States have been less ambitious. But what has truly inspired us is watching the corporate leadership of some of America’s larges and most successful organizations, as they move toward zero emissions goals. To save the environment and to find a profitable and sustainable path forward for their businesses.
In this article we’d like to talk a little bit about how feasible sustainability goals are for American organizations, and how a new cloud-based software solution from Salesforce can help your business realize your zero emissions goals.
How Is Corporate America Tackling Sustainability and Carbon Reduction?
According to the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions (C2ES), 23 States and the District of Columbia nave implemented greenhouse gas targets. Despite the United States announcing its withdrawal from the Paris Climate agreement, 24 States in America have committed to upholding the original United States commitment of reducing emissions by as much as 28% below 2005 levels, by the year 2025. These states formed the U.S. Climate Alliance.
There is no doubt that American private corporations are also becoming more sustainable. One of the interesting correlations is that sustainable businesses in the United States have been found to be more successful than less eco-friendly corporations. The most recent Barron’s Ranking of America’s Most Sustainable Companies (100) had average returns of 34.3%, outdoing the S&P 500 Index average of 31.5%. Approximately 55 companies on the Barron’s list outperformed the S&P, which is a rare occurrence.
What that communicates is that sustainable business practices are not only the ‘right thing’ to do for the environment and global ecosystem, but it can also contribute to increased success and profitability for businesses. One of the clear benefits is that reducing waste and redundancies can also significantly reduce expenses for businesses, helping them control costs, while improving corporate culture, employee engagement and morale, and overall corporate goodwill with B2C and B2B customers.
Walking the Talk: Salesforce Doubles Down on Corporate Sustainability
Speaking of successful thought leadership, eco-friendly influence and a commitment to reducing the carbon footprint, we’d like to share that Salesforce is highly devoted to sustainability in business practice. Salesforce has been named one of Barron’s Most Sustainable Companies, and is a Member of the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices.
On the corporate sustainability site, one of the first headlines you will hear encapsulates the intention and commitment to environmental protection from Salesforce. The caption reads: “The Environment Is a Key Stakeholder”.
As part of the Step-Up Declaration made by Salesforce to define the organizations sustainability goals, the following measures were announced to reduce over 100 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.
- Salesforce is on track to be using 100% renewable energy by the year 2022.
- By 2024, Salesforce will work together with suppliers for 60% of Scope 3 emissions to help them reduce emissions.
- Allocating $10 million dollars to invest in climate entrepreneurs and start-up ventures by the year 2022.
- Net Zero Carbon Emissions by 2050.
The Salesforce sustainability corporate policy and programs center not only on reducing the carbon footprint of daily operations within the organization, but also to help ensure that they are providing resources to help each customer also reduce carbon emissions.
What is the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud?
All the tools that a mid-level to enterprise level organization would need to create, organize, manage, report and aggregate sustainability data are wrapped into an easy-to-use cloud solution within Salesforce.
One of the aspects of announcing sustainability goals, is being transparent about the organizations progress with regular reporting to the executive team, shareholders and sometimes the public if requested. The data is correlated, and the practice of carbon accounting is measured within the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud against datasets from the IPCC, EPA and other organizations for a clear picture on progress and impact.
The Salesforce Sustainability Cloud utilizes the Lighting Platform to drill down into deep insights on carbon emission patters across the organization. Learn where your largest carbon footprint is happening (from what department, office or team) and track your renewable energy consumption as a net zero.
Once integrated, the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud will start calculating your carbon emissions automatically, from each connected department and data set to help executives understand where areas requiring improvement are.
Create conscious demand for your product or service, by cultivating positive brand sentiment as an organization that prioritizes environmental sustainability. Download the datasheet for the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud.
Share Your Corporate Sustainability Goals With Our Team at 6 Street Technologies
There are many initiatives our own team at 6 Street Technologies have adopted to help streamline our operational processes and reduce our organizational carbon footprint. We would love to hear about your planned initiatives and goals and provide some advice on utilizing Salesforce cloud solutions to help you reach those goals.
As Salesforce Partners and experienced developers, we can help you select applications to incorporate and build an intranet resource for your employees that helps communicate the message of sustainability to your team. In addition, we will provide expert advice on administrative features in the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud that you can customize and integrate at every level of your organization.