Expressing our support for TCFD

Climate change is one of the most significant global challenges of our time. We firmly believe that every business has the opportunity and obligation to protect our planet. That’s why we have been leaders on climate change since the company’s founding over 20 years ago. We have been carbon neutral since 2007 and in 2017, we became the first major company to match 100% of our annual electricity use with renewable energy, which we’ve done for three consecutive years. Last year we announced a new set of targets and launched our third decade of climate action: offer 1 billion people new ways to live more sustainably via our core products by 2022; become the first major company to operate on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030; and help more than 500 cities and local governments reduce a total of 1 gigaton of carbon emissions annually by 2030.

We believe that consistent, regular, transparent reporting of climate-related matters is an important complement to the substantive actions we are taking to mitigate climate change. We began calculating our annual carbon footprint in 2006, and every year since 2009, we’ve publicly reported the results to CDP. We’re proud that for seven consecutive years we’ve earned a spot on CDP’s Climate Change A List, which recognizes top reporting companies. We believe our CDP climate change response is consistent with the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).

Today, we are formally expressing our support for the TCFD reporting framework, and its seven principles for climate disclosures, as an important tool to allow stakeholders to compare corporate commitments and performance. We are committed to continuing to disclose our performance on climate measures to CDP in a way that reflects TCFD’s recommendations.

We believe that it’s critical to regularly track our environmental commitments and share updates with stakeholders. Data and transparency are important markers of the progress we are making to protect our planet.

Posted by Ruth Porat, Alphabet and Google CFO