Two multi-billion-dollar French companies – EDF and Schneider Electric – are joining global leaders to accelerate the uptake of renewables, electric vehicles and vastly improved energy productivity – in news that coincided with the milestone One Planet Summit in Paris.

 

EDF and Schneider Electric have both signed up to The Climate Group’s corporate leadership campaigns – RE100 (renewable electricity), EP100 (energy productivity) and EV100 (electric transport) – designed to accelerate the transition to a zero-emissions economy.

 

With a combined global revenue of over €95bn, the two leading companies sent out a strong signal to governments meeting in Paris on 12th December for the One Planet Summit: two years on from the adoption of the historic Paris Agreement, businesses are stepping up their contribution to its implementation.

 

Schneider Electric, a leader in the digital transformation of energy management and automation, has committed to sourcing 100-per-cent renewable electricity by 2030 through RE100, and to doubling its energy productivity by 2030 (from a 2005 baseline) through EP100. Meanwhile, French utility EDF Group has committed to transitioning to electric vehicles by 2030 through EV100, a recently launched initiative aiming to make electric transport ‘the new normal’.

 

Signing up to those initiatives will help both companies to deliver on their wider climate ambitions – for example, Schneider Electric's target to achieve carbon neutrality in its ecosystem by 2030, and EDF’s ‘Goal 2030’ pledge to “go beyond the requirements of the two degrees Celsius trajectory set by COP21”.   

 

“Today’s announcements by EDF and Schneider Electric are important moves by businesses showing their on-going commitment to delivering on the Paris agreement,” remarked Helen Clarkson, CEO of The Climate Group. “These companies are giants in their sectors, so their commitments to purchasing renewable energy, vastly improving energy productivity, and switching to electric vehicles, send clear and significant market signals.”

 

Jean-Pascal Tricoire, Chairman and CEO, Schneider Electric, added: “When it comes to the climate, I’m neither an optimist nor a pessimist – I’m an activist. Prosperity and energy are intertwined. For Schneider Electric, contributing to the process of achieving carbon neutrality is an ambitious and productive challenge. Joining The Climate Group’s EP100 and RE100 initiatives is a demonstration of how consumers and business can be empowered to ensure the affordability, resilience, sustainability and security of the energy that they consume.”

 

Jean-Bernard Lévy, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, EDF, who signed the EV100 commitment alongside The Climate Group at an event at EDF’s Paris office on Monday, said: “We believe in the importance and the development of electric mobility in towns and regions. For us, joining the EV100 initiative demonstrates this belief. And that’s why I am particularly proud of our commitment to convert the whole of our car fleet to electric by 2030. We have to be among the forerunners and show just how important this field is. This commitment answers the expectations of our stakeholders.”

 

At the One Planet Summit on Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, and UN Secretary General António Guterres gathered together heads of state and business leaders to discuss how to drive forward the implementation of the Paris Agreement and a swift transition to sustainable economy.

 

Ahead of the Summit, Schneider Electric and EDF were two of 89 French companies – representing an overall turnover of €1.5 trillion and six million jobs worldwide – that signed the 2017 French Business Climate Pledge, affirming “the need to collectively change course, in order to bring about a drastic reduction of global greenhouse (GHG) emissions”. The pledge includes a call for better carbon pricing.