How
Sustainable is Amazon?
BY
Amazon
sustainability
Amazon is the leading online
retailer, and while they appear to be making strides to lessen their
environmental impacts, they are vulnerable to a wide range of criticisms. From
products to packaging and shipping initiatives, Amazon appears to be getting
greener.
According to Adobe
Holiday Data Amazon
is the top retailer of holiday gifts in terms of social media buzz in 2014.
Amazon is an online giant, they ship an average of 3,300,000 boxes per day,
with revenues of almost $75 billion in 2013. The company is undeniably popular
and successful, but are they green? Here is a summary of their green
initiatives followed by criticisms.
Online
Amazon is the king of online retailing and a number of independent
researchers have demonstrated that online shopping is a greener option than visiting retail
outlets. Amazon is benefiting from the global trend of
consistent year over year growth of
online sales.
The fact that Amazon conducts its transactions online contributes
to the company’ smaller footprint compared to retail stores. Further, the fact
that they do not have retail outlets means that they do not use all the energy
and other resources typically associated with traditional brick and mortar
stores.
Packaging
Despite the benefits of online shopping, there is a downside. It
generates two and a half times more packaging than goods bought in a store.
However, to address this concern, Amazon is at the forefront of greener
packaging initiatives.
Most Amazon orders are shipped in corrugated containers
which contain 43 percent recovered fiber content. Once used, these containers
are 100 percent recyclable for use in the manufacture of other paper products.
Amazon’s larger products use paper packing materials that are 100
percent recyclable and are made from 50 percent recycled content. The
air-filled pillows that are sometimes used to protect items in Amazon shipments
are 100 percent recyclable and non-toxic.
In 2011, Amazon tripled the number of items shipped under its
“Frustration-Free Packaging” initiative. Amazon leverages its buying power and
pushes suppliers to cut out excessive packaging. This both reduces waste and
lowers shipping costs.
Shipping
Amazon is an innovative leader when it comes to shipping. More
sustainable shipping options run the gamut, from massive transoceanic ships to
small zero-emission vehicles. The growth of more sustainable shipping options
can provide a far greener alternative to traditional in-store shopping.
The Sustainable Shipping
Initiative (SSI) is a great example of industry working
to lower the emissions from the transportation of goods and services.
In 2010, Amazon was granted a patent for “environmentally
conscious electronic transactions.” This gives customers the option of less
carbon intensive shipping, albeit slower and more expensive than traditional
shipping. Lower emissions shipping is achieved by using hybrid or hydrogen-powered
vehicles that make more stops to make each delivery route more energy
efficient. These vehicles also travel at night to avoid congestion in cities
during the day.
In 2013, Amazon announced a truly revolutionary technology that
could radically change the way packages are delivered. They announced that they
will be using battery powered drones to deliver packages. These drones have no
emissions and they are much more efficient at delivering products than
traditional shipping mediums.
Products
What you buy largely influences the footprint of purchasing.
Amazon has two greener product options: one is Vine.com and the other is Amazon
Green.
Vine.com is part of Quidsi network, which was bought by Amazon
back in 2010. Vine.com is a shopping site that sells only green products,
including organic food, apparel, accessories and cleaning supplies made by
companies such as Seventh Generation, Method, and Burt’s Bees.
Vine.com has a
green philosophy, which means the products it carries are, “made with healthy,
environmentally sound ingredients and materials [and] at its core, is better
for you and better for the planet.”
Qualifying green
products must meet at least one of the following criteria:
- Made from sustainable materials
- Energy efficient, natural (minimal processing)
- Organic, designed to remove toxins
- Powered by renewable energy
- Reusable, or water efficient
There is also a “shop local” feature that allows shoppers to
browse green products made within 100 miles of their selected city.
Amazon Green is a cross-category program of green products. It
also includes a list of products that customers have selected as the best green
products offered by Amazon. There are a number of products that meet U.S.
environmental rating systems, including EPEAT® (the Electronic Product
Environmental Assessment Tool), ENERGY STAR®, WaterSense and USDA Organic.
In-house sustainability efforts
Amazon has energy efficient buildings and the company has launched
an internal initiative to improve environmental and energy performance. Through
what is known as the Kaizen program (Japanese for “change for the better”),
Amazon employees work together to identify and implement environmental and
energy initiatives across all parts of the company.
Through this program, Amazon
employees identify waste and design alternative solutions that are more energy
efficient.
Green buildings
Amazon has a number of green buildings, including those that
comprise their corporate headquarters in Seattle. The buildings’ interior
employs salvaged and locally sourced woods, as well as energy-efficient
lighting.
These buildings also have composting and recycling facilities. The US
Green Building Council has awarded six of these buildings with LEED Gold
certification for sustainable design and construction methods.
In addition,
Amazon.de’s corporate offices in Munich, Germany have been Gold-certified as
environmentally friendly by the German Sustainable Building Council, based on
their energy-efficient interiors and use of sustainable building materials.
The
greening of Amazon’s buildings also extend to many of Amazon’s fulfillment
centers around the world.
Additional efforts
In the summer of 2014, Amazon Web Services announced the Amazon
Climate Research Grant Program. In support of the US Government’s Climate Action Plan and the White House Climate Data Initiative,
AWS has committed to award a total of 50 million core hours of supercomputing
using Amazon EC2 Spot Instances (with training and guidance from the AWS
Scientific Computing team) to apply to research on better understanding and
mitigation of climate change.
Criticisms
Despite these efforts, Amazon has consistently ranked near the
bottom of most relevant activist lists, from Climate Counts to Greenpeace’s
Green IT rankings.
Amazon consumes vast quantities of energy and
resources. The scope and size of their operations invite scrutiny and demand
leadership.
To date, the company has demonstrated an
ongoing lack of transparency on environmental issues. Amazon is not involved
with sustainability collaborations nor does it publish a sustainability report
or report greenhouse gas emissions to CDP. Until the company publicly reports
its impacts, performance and commitments criticisms are justified and its
reputation is at risk.
Future
A recent addition may signal that Amazon is preparing to get
serious about sustainability. The company recently hired Kara Hartnett Hurst,
CEO of The Sustainability Consortium, to be the company’s first sustainability
executive. Prior to beginning her work at Amazon in October, she had amassed
more than two decades of experience in tech and sustainability.
Perhaps, like
Apple’s hiring of former EPA head Lisa Jackson, the hiring of Hurst will prove
to be a turning point for Amazon.
——————-
Richard Matthews is a
consultant, eco-entrepreneur, green investor and author of numerous articles on
sustainable positioning, eco-economics and enviro-politics. He is the owner of The Green Market Oracle, a leading
sustainable business site and one of the Web’s most comprehensive resources on
the business of the environment. Find The Green Market on Facebook and follow The Green Market’s twitter feed.