NEWSSustainability

World Green Building Week puts sustainability in the spotlight

Image of Charles RobinsonImage of Charles Robinson

With World Green Building Week 2021 focusing on creating sustainable buildings for everyone, everywhere, Charles Robinson, Director of Sustainability, explains how ASSA ABLOY is working towards the Sustainable Development Goals and advancing a resilient net zero built environment – in our operations, with our solutions and through our wider value chain.

How do ASSA ABLOY’s solutions for buildings help its customers to combat climate change?

“Our latest solutions are designed using our Sustainability Compass, a visual management tool based on a lifecycle approach to products and applying circular principles. Our doors, electronic and access control solutions’ design and features contribute to energy efficient buildings, helping our customers to achieve their carbon footprint reduction goals.”

How is ASSA ABLOY leading its industry in the World Green Building Council’s goal of Advancing Net Zero, working towards total sector de-carbonization by 2050?

“As part of our commitment to the UN Business Ambition for 1.5°C, we are committed to be net zero no later than 2050. This means net zero across our entire value chain – from our suppliers of materials, our operations right through to the complete lifecycle of our solutions.

“We will lead our industry by focusing on sustainable innovation to develop solutions that have a zero and even climate-positive footprint, we will collaborate with our supply chain partners to enable them to reduce their carbon footprint, we will utilize logistics with the lowest footprint, while reducing the footprint from our operations to zero through a data-driven strategic approach.”

What is ASSA ABLOY’s commitment to the Science Based Targets for ambitious corporate climate action?

“We are committed to reduce our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 50 percent by 2030, to set an ambitious Scope 3 target and be net zero no later than 2050. This is aligned to the most ambitious aim of the Paris Agreement.

“While we have two years to set the Science Based Targets we committed to in 2020, we are not waiting to start our reduction initiatives: we need to act now!

“We have multiple energy and carbon reduction projects underway, enabling us to build on the momentum of our sustainability programs, ensuring we are doing what is required as a global responsible citizen.”

How is ASSA ABLOY contributing to UN Sustainable Development Goal 9, ‘Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation’ and Sustainable Development Goal 13, ‘Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts’?

“We support SDG 9 by exploring ways to reduce materials, optimizing product components and streamlining production as well as transport methods. The Sustainability Compass is integrated into ASSA ABLOY’s product innovation process, embedding sustainable design into new solutions.

“Continuous efficiency improvement in our production processes reduces our climate impact and is linked to SDG 13 by considering the lifecycle impact of a product through more efficient resource use, and by applying the reduce-reuse-recycle principle.”