Red Hat goes green with new operational GHG goals

Red Hat has announced its ambition to achieve net-zero operational greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 to address the global climate crisis.

Red Hat's 2030 operational net-zero goal follows a science-aligned pathway to limit global warming to 1.5-degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and includes scope 1 and 2 emissions, and scope 3 emissions associated with Red Hat's electricity consumption in third-party colocation data centres. The company has been through a rigorous exercise to develop an emissions accounting profile, which establishes a baseline year of 2019.

"By creating a comprehensive roadmap that is built on our open hybrid cloud strategy and aligned to IBMs overall climate goals, we will reduce the impact we have on the environment and preserve the planet for generations to come," says President and Chief Cxecutive Officer of Red Hat, Matt Hicks. 

"We all play a role in reducing our carbon footprint and this is just one of the many ways that Red Hat is doing our part," he says.

To achieve the net-zero goal by 2030 or sooner, Red Hat will reduce its operational GHG emissions 65% by 2025 against 2019; prioritise energy efficiency efforts and renewable energy procurement, including a goal to achieve 75% renewable electricity by 2025, and 90% by 2030. Red Hat plans to expand renewable energy contracts to support the full operations of top consuming facilities and deploy sustainable design standards throughout the company's real estate portfolio to reduce consumption. 
 
To drive the continual improvement among suppliers and within its own value chain, Red Hat says it will engage of suppliers (by spend) by 2027 and ask them to establish and maintain their own environmental management systems, and set goals to reduce their GHG emissions.

It will invest in open source software, standardisation projects, and communities, such as the CNCF Environmental Sustainability Working Group, to harness the power of open source in helping customers, partners, suppliers, and other stakeholders to meet their climate goals and improve emissions.

The company will also develop a methodology for measuring software energy consumption and evolve reduction targets.
 
To ensure transparency and accountability, Red Hat will document and publicly disclose its GHG emissions reduction journey through the company's annual Community and Social Responsibility report and company website. Red Hats 20192021 GHG emissions data is available in Red Hat's 2021 CSR report. These goals align with IBMs commitment to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.