Telefónica will reduce by 30% its direct and indirect emissions of CO2 by the year 2020, compared to the figure of 1.7 million tonnes for 2010, measured by equivalent customer access. The announce was done by the company during the 3rd Global Workshop on Energy and Climate Change, celebrated recently in Santiago de Chile together with green ICT technology manufacturers and service providers.
To meet this new commitment, Telefónica will act in three major areas:
- Improve energy efficiency in the network with projects to reduce electricity consumption, which is responsible for 85% of CO2 emissions;
- Reduce the consumption of fossil fuels in generators, replacing them with more efficient and clean energy sources, and in vehicle fleets, by reducing their number, using low-consumption, hybrid or electric vehicles or cutting the number of kilometres driven by improving fleet management;
- Encourage and promote self-generation of renewable energy where access to electricity is difficult.
This ambitious target is part of the Strategy of Telefónica’s Office of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, in its s “green from ICT” spectrum – which considers internal energy efficiency and reduction of greenhouse gases, in operations and offices – and “green by ICT”, in other words, Green ICT services for other sectors. It also represents a further step in the company’s commitment to reduce its energy consumption in networks by 30%, measured in kWh/equivalent access, and by 10% in offices (electricity and fuel), measured in kWh/employees; the target date is 2015, with figures compared to 2007.
“This new objective represents a challenge for a growing company like Telefónica, whose number of customer accesses is continually increasing around the world, but we are convinced we can rise to the challenge and thus respond to a request which is becoming more widespread every day amongst investors, industry analysts, users, etc. In addition, it will allow us to take advantage of the opportunities to reduce emissions through the customer services we are putting in the market”, explained Silvia Guzmán, Telefónica’s director of Reputation and Sustainability.
Telefónica’s objective to reduce emissions is based on a solid process of monitoring and measurement which has been built up over five years. Currently, the company has annual AENOR-inspected inventories on energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, the latter complying with the ISO 14064 standard, the GHG Protocol and ITU-1420 methodology.
The company has managed to reduce energy consumption in networks by almost 20%, which means it is just a third away from meeting its commitment for 2015. Thus, since 2007 has achieved savings of around 22 million euros.
