Signify achieves carbon neutrality and sets course to double its positive impact on the environment and society

 Signify, the world leader in lighting, is proud to announce that it has achieved carbon neutrality for all its operations across the world as well as using 100% renewable electricity.¹ While the company progresses towards its remaining commitments for 2020, it will already embark on a new five-year journey in which it will focus on doubling its positive impact on the environment and society.

Signify achieves Carbon Neutrality in September 2020

Signify has reduced its operational emissions by more than 70% since 2010, having shifted to more energy-efficient technologies at its sites, to more sustainable modes of transport and optimized logistics planning, and to less travel in a more sustainable way. It also uses 100% renewable electricity, supported through two power purchase agreements, one in Texas and a second in Poland. The balance of emission reductions is achieved through a carbon offsetting program with projects aimed at benefiting the wellbeing of local communities.

Helen Clarkson, CEO of The Climate Group: We would like to congratulate Signify on their fantastic achievement of carbon neutrality across all operations in 2020. We have been working in partnership with Signify for over 10 years to accelerate the global adoption of energy efficient LED lighting and through Signify’s support of RE100 and EV100.”

 “The 2020s are the Climate Decade as we need to halve global emissions by 2030 to get us on track to meet the goals of the Paris agreement, so we need more companies to follow Signify’s lead in setting their own net zero targets,” she added.

Eric Rondolat, CEO of Signify: I’m extremely proud of all the Signify employees and thank them for supporting our carbon neutrality objective. It is a truly significant achievement for us and we call on many others to join us.”

 “However, the world is still facing demographic change, urbanization, climate change and resource scarcity. This is not a time to pause and celebrate, but a time to become even more ambitious and accelerate our efforts to address these challenges. Growth for sustainability and providing a great place to work are firmly anchored as central parts of our company strategy. This means that when it comes to sustainability, we will go beyond carbon neutrality and double our positive impact on the environment and on society in 2025,” he added.

Brighter Lives, Better World 2025: Our new sustainability program beyond carbon neutrality

Today, Signify starts implementing its new sustainability program and sets course to double its positive impact on the environment and society.The UN Sustainable Development Goals will be used as its strategic compass to work towards the following four goals:

Double the pace of the Paris Agreement:

As part of our commitment to climate action (SDG13), we will go beyond carbon neutrality and reduce carbon emissions over our entire value chain. Already in 2025, we will achieve the 2031 target set out for companies in the Paris agreement to limit temperature rises to 1.5°C over pre-industrial times. We will do so by increasing the energy efficiency of our portfolio, which will reduce emissions of our customers, and by driving carbon reductions at our suppliers.

We also call upon the world to accelerate the adoption of affordable and clean energy (SDG7). Our highly energy-efficient LED lighting saves an average of 50% of the electricity consumed by conventional lighting. An additional saving of around 30% is achieved by using connectivity and lighting control systems. Moreover, we believe that the expansion of solar-powered lighting systems will provide another very effective opportunity to reduce carbon emissions.

Double the circular revenues to 32%:

Making our economy more circular has become more important than ever. Today we use 1.6 times the resources our planet can sustain and resource scarcity and waste have reached worrying proportions. We are committed to responsible consumption and production (SDG12) with products that can be reprinted, refurbished, reused or recycled. This will help us to achieve our goal of doubling our revenues from circular products, systems and services to 32% in 2025. This includes revenues from 3D printed luminaires, which we were the first lighting company to develop at scale, and from streetlights with reusable components and recyclable parts that we introduced earlier this year.

As part of our commitment to a circular economy, we have also committed to sustainable packaging, removing plastics from all our consumer packaging before the end of 2021, and to sending zero waste to landfill.

Double the revenues for brighter lives, through innovations that benefit society, to 32%:

We are committed to supporting good health and wellbeing (SDG3) and sustainable cities and communities (SDG11).  We will double the percentage of our revenues for brighter lives, which benefit society, to 32%. This includes revenues from lighting innovations which increase food availability, safety & security or health & wellbeing.

Double the commitment to diversity and inclusion and double our % women in leadership to 34%:

“We are committed to decent work & economic growth (SDG8) and to creating a great place to work. We will strengthen our commitment to diversity & inclusion and aim to double the percentage of women in leadership in our business to 34%. And we will further strengthen our commitments to employee safety, supplier sustainability and lives lit through our Signify Foundation.

More information on our commitments and updates on our progress can be found on company’s sustainability pages.