AXA SA and Burberry Group Plc are joining an array of companies committing to going green.
Burberry expects to source all of its electricity from clean energy by 2022, while Copenhagen-based international brewing company Carlsberg A/S plans to switch to 100 percent renewable power at its breweries by that year, according to a statement from The Climate Group, an international non-profit.
AXA, meanwhile, is planning to use only renewable energy by 2025. The Paris-based insurance company plans to buy clean energy directly and compensate for electricity that isn’t from renewable sources. And Akzo Nobel NV, the Amsterdam-based paints and coatings company, plans to be carbon neutral and be 100 percent dependent on clean energy by 2050.
They’re following a path forged by technology companies including Alphabet Inc.’s Google, which expects to be powered entirely by clean energy this year. But renewable electricity is no longer just a tech story. Corporations are finding that wind and solar power is competitive with thermal fuels, including gas-fired generation.
In the U.S., corporations agreed to buy nearly 3.7 gigawatts of power generated by clean-energy projects in 2015, and another 2.5 gigawatts last year, almost all from wind and solar, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
With the commitments from Akzo Nobel, AXA, Burberry and Carlsberg, the Climate Group has reached its goal of convincing 100 companies to commit to source all of their electricity from renewables three years ahead of target. The 100 members include 30 global Fortune 500 companies.