Rivian, a U.S. electric vehicle manufacturer, is producing 100,000 delivery vehicles for Amazon by 2030. Some 10,000 vehicles should be on the road by 2022. (Jordan Stead / Amazon Photo)

Amazon has pledged to make its retail and cloud-computing operations “net carbon zero” by 2040, but its newly released 2019 sustainability report shows that greenhouse gas emissions rose over the previous year by 15%.

Emissions did grow more slowly than net sales, which increased 22% last year from 2018, but the increase illustrates the challenge the company faces in its quest to go carbon neutral.

This is the first time that the Seattle-based company has issued a sustainability report. Amazon, which has seen a significant, recent increase in its embrace of environmental initiatives, is also spearheading the Climate Pledge — an effort that calls on other corporations to likewise agree to slashing their greenhouse gas emissions and supporting measures to capture carbon.

On Tuesday the company also announced its $2 billion Climate Pledge Fund, which will allow for investments in companies and technologies that will help it and others reach climate and sustainability goals.

The 84-page sustainability report covers Amazon’s greenhouse gas emissions, its progress on meeting renewable energy goals, the sustainability and sourcing of Amazon-brand retail goods, reductions in packaging waste and workforce information.

Amazon announced that it would run entirely on renewable energy by 2025, shaving five years from its earlier goal. Amazon reached 42% renewables last year. To tackle its power use for energy-hungry cloud computing, last month Amazon announced five new renewable energy projects in China, Australia, Ohio, and Virginia to help drive AWS operations.

The report fleshed out details on which standards it’s using for calculating its carbon footprint and who is verifying the math. While the company’s overall emissions are up from 44.4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MMT CO2e) two years ago to 51.2 MMT CO2e last year, the report said that its “carbon intensity metric” — a measure of pollution per dollar earned — had decreased. It dropped 5%, declining from 128.9 grams of CO2e per dollar of Gross Merchandise Sales in 2018 to 122.8 grams last year.

“Like many companies in high growth mode, we look at the absolute tons of carbon in our footprint, but also at how we are improving our carbon intensity,” states the report. “Our first year-over-year comparison shows progress as we continue to make investments in innovation, technologies and products that will decarbonize our operations over future years.”

The bulk of the emissions come from what is called “indirect sources” that include production, use and disposal of Amazon-branded products; capital goods such as building construction, hardware and vehicles; corporate travel and packaging. These sources total 78% of Amazon’s emissions and pose arguably the greatest hurdle for shrinking the company’s carbon footprint — which is a struggle shared by many corporations.

University of Washington researchers Nives Dolsak and Aseem Prakash, who focus on sustainability and corporate issues, recently posted an article about the corporate difficulties of reducing these greenhouse gas sources. They include the challenge of convincing consumers to select more planet friendly products.

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