With Climate Week NYC 2017 underway in New York, Vince Digneo, Sustainability Strategist, Adobe, blogs on the company’s efforts to reduce its emissions in India and the benefits for the local community.
Adobe’s Bangalore site is going solar. We recently signed a 2.5-megawatt, grid-scale, solar power purchase agreement (PPA) for our Bangalore office, which will provide enough power to cover our annual energy demand.
Adobe is proud to be among the first US-headquartered technology companies in India to have a facility powered entirely by renewable energy, an important step toward our commitment of sourcing 100% renewables globally.
Why this matters
Bangalore is our first major purchase of renewable energy, and while it’s a small step toward our end goal, it’s a milestone. The purchase moves Adobe closer to our RE100 goal - a promise we made in 2015, along with nearly one hundred of our peers and with guidance from The Climate Group - of reaching 100% renewable electricity for all of our operations and digital delivery of our products.
Our target date for 100% renewables is 2035. This might seem a long way off, but Adobe is focusing on direct and open access renewable energy - this means that the energy we purchase is adding directly to the local power grid. This process will take us more time than using carbon offsets or unbundled renewable energy certificates (RECs), but we think it’s worth it.
Our project in Bangalore shows that a direct purchase of renewable energy makes the right kind of impact for our company and our community. Here’s how it works.
With the right renewable energy policies in place, and thorough research on local projects and developers, we were able to sign into the open access PPA in the state of Karnataka to power our Bangalore site.
Adobe’s purchase, along with other large energy purchases in the state, has allowed the solar energy developers to add more solar panels to their farm. As with all grid-scale, renewable energy PPAs, the power generated goes directly into the local grid, becoming which part of the pool of energy that ultimately provides power for local schools, businesses, citizens, and our office in Bangalore.
Because of this solar power purchase, Bangalore and the state of Karnataka will burn less coal for their local needs - a major part of India’s goal to transition to renewable energy. This means we’re helping clean up local air and lower emissions in a community where our employees live and where we do business.
And as an important part of running our business sustainably, we also expect to save money on this purchase, while contributing to an infrastructure that we think will provide more consistent energy prices and allow more power users to move to renewables. With all of these benefits, we can’t help but think that direct access renewable energy is the future of corporate sustainability, and we’re thrilled to be helping to blaze the trail.
In addition to our renewable energy purchase, we’re also proud to report that we’ve transitioned our India vehicle fleet to more sustainable options, placing into service 47 electric vehicles.
Part of a bigger plan
Targeting 100% renewable power means we’re working on a lot of fronts at once. Here are the focus areas of our renewable energy strategy:
- We first work to make each of our offices as energy efficient as possible. Currently, 78% of our workforce is in LEED certified space;
- we’ve also partnered with the Science Based Targets initiative to set emissions targets for each of our sites;
- we are committed to investigating on-site renewable energy options and new technologies when it makes economic sense;
- we work with NGOs and other companies to advocate policies - like the one in Karnataka that allowed us to make an open access PPA - that will help all of us move toward renewables; and,
- we’re planning to enter into more direct or open access renewable energy PPAs; the type of energy plan we think has the biggest impact on the environment.
Nobody can go it alone
We’re excited about what we’ve achieved in Bangalore, but when it comes to sustainability, no one can do it alone. We collaborate with NGO partners, along with other committed companies. Together, we share what works (and what doesn’t). And we combine our influence to support legislation for sustainability.
With our peers, we continue to embrace the science-based targets that help us own our total emissions, and hold us accountable for reducing them. And, during Climate Week NYC 2017, we have more opportunities to share our best ideas and to strengthen the commitments that are helping us do our part for our communities, our employees and our shareholders.
For more information, read about Adobe’s recent placement on the Dow Jones Sustainability Index, Adobe’s sustainability efforts, and the company’s commitment to the Paris Agreement.