PayPal, Inc. - How We Work - Environmental Sustainability

We believe in the power of digital financial inclusion to help underserved communities build climate resilience and foster opportunities in the global net-zero economy. That’s why we pursue opportunities to harness the scale of our platform to support an equitable climate transition and remain committed to advancing science-based action.

Our Approach to Environmental Sustainability.

Managing our impact

Since 2017, we’ve published annual environmental performance updates in our Global Impact Report and demonstrated meaningful improvements to our management systems and processes. We also continue to enhance our environmental management system in alignment with ISO 14001. Please see our Environmental Policy for additional details.

Mobilizing our people

Our employees care deeply about the environment and volunteer their time and skills throughout the year to address sustainability issues. Whether it’s volunteering on Earth Day, participating in Global Climate Action Week, using our remote working sustainability checklist, or encouraging environmental innovation, we’re harnessing the creativity and passion of our people to advance our sustainability agenda.

Driving innovation

We’re pursuing opportunities to drive positive environmental impact with our products and services. With the addition of Happy Returns as a PayPal service, customers have access to a network of Return Bars where online returns are aggregated into reusable totes that help reduce cardboard waste and greenhouse gas emissions when compared to returns by mail – saving 120,000 pounds of carbon dioxide for every 1 million returns.

Climate Action Strategy

We believe that financial security is critical to the resilience of individuals, organizations and communities impacted by a changing climate. The destabilizing effects of climate change, including increasingly frequent and severe storms, droughts and heatwaves, are disproportionately borne by the financially underserved.¹ As part of our mission to democratize financial services, we are exploring opportunities to mobilize our payments platform and manage our global environmental impacts to support an equitable transition to a net-zero economy.

Learn about our commitment to supplier diversity

Science-based emissions target

We have established ambitious, measurable science-based emissions reduction targets informed by stakeholder consultation and validated by the Science Based Targets initiative. We will transparently track progress toward our long-term goal of achieving net-zero GHG emissions across our value chain by 2040 and medium-term science-based targets aligned with limiting temperature rise to no more than 1.5˚C.

Renewable & efficient energy use

We are identifying and incorporating energy efficiency measures and renewable energy use across our operations. In 2021, we achieved our renewable energy goal by matching 100% of the energy from our data center operations with renewable generation, two years ahead of our original commitment of 2023.

Watch this video to learn more

Transparency & reporting

As part of our environmental sustainability strategy, we are committed to full transparency of our climate risks and opportunities in line with the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and other environmental reporting standards. We publish our annual energy and emissions inventory in our Global Impact Report and respond to the CDP Climate Change Survey.

Climate advocacy

As a global corporate citizen, we recognize the role businesses can play to promote coordinated action across the private, public, and nonprofit sectors to address climate change and other environmental challenges. PayPal has joined coalitions including United for the Paris Agreement and We Mean Business which encourage others to support the objectives of the Paris Climate Agreement. We also lend our support to local, national, and global public policies aligned with our mission and values.

¹The World Bank Group’s 2016 report entitled “Managing the Impacts of Climate Change on Poverty” illustrates the disproportionate impact of climate change on poor communities, which are more vulnerable to its direct and indirect impacts.

Photo credit: AMBIO

Digital finance for climate resilience.

PayPal is exploring the connections between digital finance and climate resilience to identify solutions that can build a net-zero and more equitable global economy.

A new climate Task Force, funded by PayPal and in collaboration with climate and digital finance experts, launched the Digital Finance for Climate Resilience(DF4CR) Framework for Action. The Framework illustrates the opportunity for the digital finance sector to build greater climate resilience among financially underserved populations.

PayPal is a founding supporter of a climate focused cohort of Catalyst Fund – a global inclusive tech accelerator to help startups build and deliver inclusive digital finance products and services. The fund championed seven startup companies to launch and scale services that enable greater resilience for climate-vulnerable communities, such as farmers, fishers, and urban poor in Latin America, Africa and India, through catalytic capital, bespoke venture-building support, and direct connections with investors and corporate innovators.

Water management & resilience

We’ve implemented various water conservation measures across our operations, including smart-sensor and low-flow fixtures in our offices and water efficiency monitoring at our data centers.

We’ve assessed the water resilience of our global facilities portfolio using analytical tools including the World Resources Institute Aqueduct tool.

Employee-led Waste Audit at PayPal Headquarters

Waste management

Nearly all PayPal offices globally have implemented recycling programs, and many have food waste composting as well. We continue to work with local waste hauling providers and municipal jurisdictions to offer waste recycling in locations where it’s not currently provided.

We have implemented a zero-landfill strategy for electronic waste (e-waste) throughout our operations. For both data center and office electronics, our IT asset disposal service providers are certified to the R2, e-Stewards, or WEEELabex standard for responsible e-waste management.