The Climate Pledge was founded by Amazon and Global Optimism, a climate-advocacy company led by founders Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac, who have worked respectively as the UN climate chief and a political strategist at a company involved with the delivery of the Paris Agreement. The Pledge is Amazon’s effort to appear more eco-friendly, whether that’s because they are trying to decrease their impact on the environment or they’re greenwashing to appease climate-conscious consumers.

The goal of The Climate Pledge is to go carbon-neutral by 2040, ten years before required by the Paris Agreement, using methods defined in the three commitments of their mission. Each company that has signed The Climate Pledge agrees to go carbon-neutral by 2040, and the Pledge describes their commitments as the following: including regular and accurate public reporting of GHG emissions, reducing emissions through methods in accordance with the Paris Agreement, and offsetting emissions through reputable and effective means.

In order to reach net-zero emissions, companies must decrease the emissions they produce, but the production of their goods or services will almost always produce some levels of greenhouse gases, even after intense reduction efforts, so it makes sense to include offsets in their effort. The Climate Pledge says that these offsets should be “quantifiable, real, permanent, and socially beneficial,” though it isn’t clear if there are any repercussions if they aren’t. Additionally, companies that agree are only “encouraged” to make sure that the offsets they purchase “are verified and registered with a third-party verification standard.”

Overall, the initiative is certainly better than nothing, but consumers should be skeptical, especially as there are no consequences if a company fails to meet the goals established by the Pledge. It is unclear how companies are held accountable, and when the entire page is filled with less-than-clear jargon that leave more questions than answers. The following is an excerpt from their page that a group of college chemistry students deemed indecipherable and meaningless:

Signatories commit to net-zero by 2040 across all emissions scopes. The scopes covered in a company’s target setting are defined by the company, with the strong encouragement to utilize an existing best practice target setting methodology.

Signatories commit to net-zero by 2040 across all emissions scopes. The scopes covered in a company’s target setting are defined by the company, with the strong encouragement to utilize an existing best practice target setting methodology.

It is clear in this excerpt that there are no defined rules that companies are held accountable for when it comes to emission scopes (whatever that means), and the ambiguity of the page omits the responsibility of reporting significant and important information.

Although the Pledge is progress, it is also a reminder to think critically about companies’ claims, especially if they repeat information with little substance, such as phrases that have words like “green,” “sustainable,” or “eco-friendly,” instead of measurable information like statistics. It’s really easy to say a string of buzzwords that don’t have any tangible meaning, because it can make a product or company look like they are spending money and effort on a project even if they have no interest in it.

I decided that I wanted to stagger my posts on mosquitoes, since this isn’t a page really dedicated to mosquitoes, but found myself really frustrated with this topic. In an effort to cover something more simple for the sake of time (I have a chemistry and biology exam this week and a lot of calculus homework to do), I chose to look into Amazon’s climate status. Unfortunately, the information I found was vague, and I found little credible information online vouching for or against the efficacy of Amazon’s claims, and ended up taking me far more time than I’d like to admit in my fruitless search for statistical data. The aforementioned group of college students was regarding my Chem 1B study group, who I asked for help with deciphering the jargon from the website. They asked me to repeat it multiple times before all staring at me with a dead look in their eyes. They are currently sitting around me, actually doing chemistry problems, which I should also be doing.

Although I’m suspicious of the information I found, I will say that I found more than I expected regarding Amazon’s commitments, because meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement a decade early is a notable objective, even if it’s a business strategy. Either way, thanks for reading, and stay tuned to learn with me!

https://www.theclimatepledge.com/us/en/the-pledge/FAQ

https://sustainability.aboutamazon.com