Amazon Pledges to Meet Paris Climate Pact 10 Years Early

(Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. made a significant commitment to environmental sustainability Thursday, promising to meet the terms of the Paris Climate agreement 10 years early.

Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos made the Amazon Climate Pledge at a press conference in Washington, against a backdrop of criticism from activists and a vocal group of his own employees and a day before workers around the world are scheduled to walk out to spotlight climate change.

“We have been in the middle of the pack on this issue,” Bezos said. “We want to move to the forefront. We want to be leaders.”

Dara O’Rourke, who heads Amazon’s sustainability team, said 40% of the energy the company uses now comes from renewable sources and will reach 80% by 2024 and 100% by 2030 on the way to becoming net carbon neutral by 2040. To help it get there, Amazon has placed an order of 100,000 electric vans from Rivian Automotive Inc., in which it has invested. The first vehicles will arrive in 2021.

To contact the reporter on this story: Brad Stone in San Francisco at bstone12@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net, Molly Schuetz, Robin Ajello

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