More Than 6,000 Amazon Employees Sign Letter Urging Company to Increase Sustainability Initiatives

More than 6,000 Amazon employees have signed a letter urging the company to release a company-wide climate plan based on six specific principles. As published on Medium, the letter asks that Amazon’s board and its executive committee adopt the following six initiatives:

1. Public goals and timelines consistent with science and the IPCC report. Emissions must be cut in half by 2030 from 2010 levels and reach zero by 2050. Goals must span all organizations and businesses and cover the full supply chain.
2. A complete transition away from fossil fuels rather than relying on carbon offsets.
3. Prioritization of climate impact when making business decisions, including ending all custom solutions specifically designed for oil and gas extraction and exploration.
4. Reduction of harm to the most vulnerable communities first. The pollution we generate is not equally distributed, and climate impact will be felt first and hardest by Black, Indigenous, and other communities of color, particularly in the Global South. We must prioritize our pollution reduction in these communities.
5. Advocacy for local, federal, and international policies that reduce overall carbon emissions in line with the IPCC report and withholding of support from policymakers who delay action on climate change.
6. Fair treatment of all employees during climate disruptions and extreme weather events. Unsafe or inaccessible workplaces should not be a reason to withhold pay, terminate, or otherwise, penalize employees — including hourly and contract workers.

Though Amazon has announced and implemented several sustainability practices in recent years, employees feel — for a company with such a global footprint and a well of resources — the plan is severely lacking.

In response to the letter, an Amazon spokesperson issued a statement to Business Insider, which said, in part, that the company has recently launched “several major and impactful programs” and that it has more than 200 scientists, engineers, and product designers dedicated exclusively to inventing new ways to leverage the company’s scale for the good of customers and the planet. “We have a long-term commitment to powering our global infrastructure using 100% renewable energy,” the statement said.

Recent Initiatives

A rundown of the company’s latest sustainability announcements are as follows:

In March, the company announced, as part of its efforts to achieve 50% net zero carbon deliveries by 2030, that it’s offering Prime members an “Amazon Day” delivery option. Amazon Day encourages Prime members to choose a day of the week to be their designated delivery day, making it easier to get purchases grouped and delivered together — often in fewer packages, the company says. In fact, in an ongoing test of the program, packaging has been reduced by tens of thousands of boxes

In December 2018, Amazon announced the Amazon Sustainability Data Initiative to promote sustainability research, innovation and problem-solving by making key data easily accessible and even more widely available.

The Amazon Sustainability Data Initiative leverages Amazon Web Services’ technology and scalable infrastructure to stage, analyze, and distribute data and is a joint effort between the AWS Open Data and Amazon Sustainability teams. The AWS Open Data program already makes numerous datasets available for public use through its Registry of Open Data on AWS. Amazon’s Sustainability Team began collaborating with AWS last year to start warehousing the vast amounts of public data that describe our planet. The initiative identifies foundational data for sustainability and works closely with data providers like NOAA to stage their data in the AWS Cloud by giving them complete ownership and control over how their data is shared.

And in October 2018, the company announced it will invest $10 million in Closed Loop Fund to support recycling infrastructure in the US, including increasing the availability of curbside recycling for 3 million homes in communities across the country. The online retail giant said that by making it easier for customers to recycle and by further developing end markets for recycled commodities, the investment will divert 1 million tons of recyclable material from landfill into the recycling stream and eliminate the equivalent of 2 million metric tons of CO2 by 2028.

Closed Loop Fund is a project that invests in scaling recycling infrastructure and sustainable manufacturing technologies. It aims to eliminate more than 16 million tons of greenhouse gas, divert more than 8 million cumulative tons of waste from landfills, improve recycling for more than 18 million households, and save nearly $60 million for American cities over the next 10 years.

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