Schneider Electric has committed to zero net biodiversity loss in their direct operations by 2030. The Global Biodiversity Score, assessing the group’s value chain impact on biodiversity, found that most of the pressures on natural ecosystems were related to their greenhouse gas emissions and land use. With a better understanding of their impact, they were able to prioritise which actions to take to meet their biodiversity ambition. Their new biodiversity strategy emphasises on advancing their circular economy efforts through using fewer natural resources to reduce their climate impact and leave room for nature. For instance, one of the key circular opportunities for Schneider Electric is the retrofit solution, ECOFIT™. This program was developed to facilitate equipment upgrades by replacing only certain key components, rather than the whole system. In this way, they can keep products in use for longer, reducing both their demand for new materials and their climate impact.
Biodiversity benefits
In 2020, through their circular economy actions, including ECOFIT™, recycling, and take-back programmes, Schneider Electric avoided 157,000 metric tonnes of primary resource consumption, preventing all the negative impacts from the extraction and energy-intensive processing of those materials.
This page is part of a deep dive into biodiversity across other sectors, where we delve deeper into examples of companies adopting circular economycircular economyA systems solution framework that tackles global challenges like climate change, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution. It is based on three principles, driven by design: eliminate waste and pollution, circulate products and materials (at their highest value), and regenerate nature. principles with positive impacts on biodiversity.
