Earth Month 2024: Spotlighting sustainable innovation and growth
By Niki King, Vice President and Head of Sustainability
It’s officially Earth Month, an opportunity to celebrate the planet we all share and remind ourselves of the role we all play in taking care of our world. Now more than ever, there is an urgency to understand the effects of climate change, engage in dialogue with those driving change and take steps to reduce the impact we have on our environment.
As a business, Clorox has long understood that sustainability is not simply a tagline — it’s an intentional and integrated part of our IGNITE strategy. We’ve taken measurable actions to tackle our operational emissions and waste footprints while mobilizing our teammates, supply chain partners and consumers to do the same. While there’s still a lot to do, we believe we’re on the right track, as reflected by our No. 1 ranking on Barron’s 100 Most Sustainable Companies list for a second consecutive year and our inclusion among Newsweek’s Greenest Companies in America.
Here are some of the actions we’ve taken:
Climate
We’ve established science-based greenhouse gas reduction targets for our operations and value chain emissions globally. To date, we’ve met our 2030 goal for scopes 1 and 2 and our 100% renewable electricity goal in the U.S. and Canada. We also anticipate validation of our 2050 net-zero target by the Science Based Targets initiative in the coming weeks.
We’re proud of the progress made so far, but we’re not slowing down. Amid rapidly evolving regulations in this space, we’re wasting no time advancing our reporting practices and building a scope 3 supplier engagement program to promote decarbonization practices in our supply chain. This will improve transparency, which helps us ensure we’re on track to achieve our net-zero ambition.
Waste
plant in Dammam, Saudi Arabia achieve zero-waste-
to-landfill status.
We also continue to make steady progress minimizing our waste footprint by reducing our overall volume of materials, increasing the sustainability of our materials and minimizing the impact left behind after our consumers use our products. Two of our plants in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia recently joined the more than 30 Clorox facilities around the world in achieving zero-waste-to-landfill status as we continue the momentum toward our goal of achieving ZWtL in 100% of our plants by 2025 and in all facilities globally by 2030. Meanwhile, in Latin America, our plant in Lima, Peru, is piloting new packaging methods to eliminate unnecessary plastic and cardboard used in product shipping, which advances our efforts to achieve 50% combined reduction in virgin plastic and fiber packaging by 2030.
These wins — and the learnings gathered along the way — are critical to our continued success as we explore opportunities to scale sustainable innovation across our operations.
Sustainable Product Innovation
Innovation at Clorox is all about building trusted brands people love that meet their ever-evolving needs. We mainly do this by developing products that use less packaging overall and/or more sustainable packaging materials and leave less waste behind after they’re used. Here are a few of our latest product launches created with the planet in mind:
- Brita recently introduced a Refillable Filter, which reduces plastic waste by 80% compared to the standard filter over the course of three years. Compatible with nearly all existing Brita systems, this refillable filter comes with a reusable plastic shell so only the refills — which are made of coconut husks and can be recycled through Terracycle — get discarded.
- Burt’s Bees unveiled a new Lip Sleeping Mask, which contains responsibly sourced beeswax and comes in 96% post-consumer recycled plastic packaging. Additionally, the business rolled out a mango edition of its popular shea collection, including Body Oil and Hand & Body Butter, which uses shea butter responsibly sourced from women-led communities in West Africa.
- Pine-Sol just launched a new 2x concentrated formula for both its retail and professional multisurface cleaners. Because it now offers twice the cleaning power in a smaller bottle — 40% smaller for retail and 50% smaller for professional — that means less plastic is used per drop of cleaning solution. Additionally, these new Pine-Sol bottles are made with a minimum of 50% post-consumer recycled plastic.
- To accompany the new Clorox Scentiva Disinfecting Mist, there’s a bottle refill option to help keep additional plastic waste from the trigger out of landfills. Plus, when the shrink sleeve is removed from these bottles, they’re recyclable in many municipalities (per the instructions on the bottle).
Mobilizing Our Teammates
preservation and restoration of local public parks.
In honor of Earth Month, we’re kicking off a special employee giving campaign to build on our Healthy Parks Project. Launched in 2021, this initiative involves working with local organizations to provide better access to green spaces within communities where our teammates live and work. For every employee donation made this month to one of our three Healthy Parks Project partners — Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, Durham Parks Foundation and Park Pride Atlanta — or another environmental cause of their choice, The Clorox Company Foundation will match it 200% up to $10,000. Through employee volunteering and financial contributions, we’re continuing to spur positive impact in our communities by ensuring that our parks thrive for generations to come.
As we evaluate the next steps in our sustainability journey, we embrace our responsibility to not only drive innovative impact but also to truly get it right. Here’s to another bountiful Earth Month!