EC Environmental Policy

These celebrities suck but you probably do too. We use 500 million plastic straws every day in the U.S. Many of those plastic straws end up in our oceans, polluting the water and harming sea life. If we don't act now, by 2050 plastics in the ocean will outweigh the fish. One small change can have a big impact: #stopsucking on plastic straws.

Molson Coors launched its 2025 sustainability strategy and goals, which include plans to achieve zero waste to landfill across all major manufacturing facilities, cut carbon emissions by 50%, increase water efficiency by 22% across breweries, and more.

Equinix announced plans to install on-site fuel cells, with a total capacity of more than 37MW, at 12 of its data centers across the United States, marking what the company claims is the largest deployment of fuel cells in the colocation data center industry to date. The fuel cells are projected to avoid 660,000 tons of carbon emissions and save 87 billion gallons of water over the course of 15 years.

CVS Health has joined GreenBlue's Sustainable Packaging Coalition to advance efforts around reducing product packaging waste in collaboration with its suppliers. The Sustainable Packaging Coalition has more than 190 members, including Amazon, BASF, Dow Chemical, Johnson & Johnson, McDonald's, and more.

According to a report issued this week by the NGO Mighty Earth, the U.S. meat industry is largely responsible for what has become the largest "dead zone" ever in the Gulf of Mexico. While past studies have showcased the meat and poultry sectors' impact on both the environment and public health, Mighty's study sheds light on the large agribusiness companies the NGO says contribute to the Gulf's ongoing environmental degradation attributed to algae blooms.

Roughly 20 pieces of clothing per person are manufactured each year. Growth of the multi-trillion-dollar apparel industry has been fed by "fast fashion," which makes clothing cheaply and quickly with a low price-tag. These visuals illustrate why the apparel industry must embrace a new approach to sustainably meet demand in tomorrow's markets.

Nestle's half-liter bottles of water sold in the US under the Deer Park, Pure Life, Poland Spring, Ice Mountain, Ozarka, Arrowhead and Zephyrhills brands now feature the new How2Recycle label. The label reminds consumers to replace the cap before recycling the empty bottle.

The Sierra Club on Monday filed a lawsuit against the US Department of Energy demanding that DOE identify the groups and individuals it consulted with on a soon-to-be released nationwide electric grid reliability study. "We want to make sure that when this study is finally released, that the public and policy makers fully understand how [DOE] went about doing it, who they were influenced by, and whose views they did not take into consideration," said Sierra Club attorney Casey Roberts.

Salesforce is now sourcing 100% renewable energy for two of its office towers - Salesforce East and Salesforce West - in San Francisco through the San Francisco Public Utility Commission's CleanPowerSF program. Salesforce is CleanPowerSF's largest commercial customer to date.

Johnson & Johnson revamped its Design for Environment program into the new Earthwards program, which brings together branding, marketing, R&D and its supply chain to produce products that continually perform well in an internally designed, strict environmental process, says Paulette Frank, the company's worldwide VP of environment, health, safety and sustainability.

Largely recognized as a furniture retailer, IKEA also derives revenue from its store-based restaurants, where the company says it is working to make sustainable, affordable, transparent, traceable and animal welfare-friendly practices the norm.

The Sierra Club announced that the Orlando City Commission unanimously approved a resolution mandating that the city run 100 percent on renewables by 2050. But as more cities announce these plants, are they backed up by staff and funding?

In its 2017 Annual Report, the Chemical Footprint Project - an initiative driving the effective management of chemicals in product supply chains - demonstrates how chemical footprinting is increasingly moving towards the mainstream. The report shares how businesses from across industries stack up against four pillars - management strategy, chemical inventory, footprint measurement and public disclosure and verification - and provides investors and purchasers with data that enables them to benchmark firms on their progress.

A partnership between global customs and logistics company UPS and TerraCycle has reached a major milestone - by transforming hard-to-recycle items such as toothpaste tubes and snack bags into new products, the two organizations have diverted 40 million pounds of waste from landfills since 2012. TerraCycle has been utilizing UPS's expertise and technology solutions to scale its global recycling programs and customer base, which has allowed the company to turn 3.5 billion pieces of waste into useful products such as trash cans and park benches.

Producing the meat that goes into US pet foods results in 64 million tons of greenhouse gases each year, according UCLA's Gregory Okin. The geographer's newly published study encourages less-meaty or plant-based pet foods.

The Rainforest Action Network claims that PepsiCo's Palm Oil Action Plan Progress Report, released last week, is basically a sham. PepsiCo must begin enforcing environmental violations throughout its supply chain, or RAN intends to continue negative PR efforts against the company and its financial supporters.

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has signed into law a statewide goal to reduce food waste by 50% by 2030.

PepsiCo announced that 89% of its palm oil has been traced to the mill level-up from 65% in 2015. The company also announced that 16% of its palm oil is now Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) physically certified sustainable.

JPMorgan Chase has committed to using renewable energy to meet 100% of its global energy needs by 2020. The bank also committed to facilitating $200 billion in clean financing through 2025.

Apple announced that the Forest Stewardship Council has certified 320,000 acres of working forest that it supports in China. The 320,000 acres of certified working forest reportedly covers 100% of Apple's product packaging needs.