Stepping Up Our Environmental Focus
Again named to Dow Jones Sustainability Indices, Symantec continues to push towards a low carbon future
Originally published on Symantec Blog | Corporate Responsibility
Symantec is proud to be one of the twenty-one technology companies stepping up to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across all sectors of society. We’ve joined the Step Up Declaration, a new alliance dedicated to harnessing the power of emerging technologies and the fourth industrial revolution to ensure a climate turning point by 2020.
As part of our commitment to climate action, we focused efforts around energy efficiency in our buildings as electricity use in our data centers, labs and offices account for more than 90 percent of these emissions. Buildings account for around 40 percent of global energy consumption, producing over a third of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.[I]
We use the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification, an internationally recognized green building system, to guide the design, construction, fit out and operations of our buildings. We pursue LEED certifications for major renovation projects for Symantec-owned and long-leased facilities and achieved LEED Platinum (the highest rating) at four facilities in India (EON Pune, Mumbai, Gurgaon and Bangalore).
As we celebrate World Green Building Week, we are working on multiple fronts to deliver meaningful GHG reductions through a combination of energy efficiency, space consolidation and clean power sources.
We are also collaborating with others to leverage our collective influence. In addition to the Step Up Declaration, we are active members of the Ceres BICEP coalition, BSR Future of Internet Power collaboration, the Renewable Energy Buyer’s Principles, and we have signed up to participate in the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTI).
We encourage you to learn more about adopting sustainable building practices this week and to join us in our efforts to promote a low carbon future. Making simple changes in your everyday life can help our planet. Here are three easy ways to green your home (and save money at the same time!):
- Install programmable thermostats to regulate your home’s temperature. Turn off the AC/heat when no one’s home, lower the temperature when people are sleeping, and save on heating and cooling costs.
- Replace your light bulbs with compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) and light-emitting diodes (LEDs) to save energy and decrease your electricity bills over time.
- Choose energy-efficient appliances certified by Energy Star and check with your electricity provider to see if it offers incentives for replacing old appliances with more efficient ones.
Symantec is proud to be again named a Sustainability Leader on both the Dow Jones Sustainability (DJSI) World and DJSI North America indices along with just a handful of other software technology companies. The DJSI represents the gold standard for corporate sustainability and this is our 12th consecutive year listed on the North America Index and our 11th consecutive year on the World Index. The analysis assesses the world’s largest companies based on financially material Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) factors.
