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Business travel: world’s biggest tech companies have halved their business flying compared with 2019

11. September 2024
New analysis by T&E shows that while an impressive number of tech companies have cut their flying in half since 2019, companies which have not set targets to reduce flying emissions are slowly creeping back to 2019 levels. These include tech giants Google and Apple.

A new analysis by Travel Smart, a campaign led by T&E, has found that the business travel emissions of 26 of the world’s major tech companies in 2023 dropped by an average of 49% compared to 2019. This is a significant reduction that shows many tech companies are on the right path to cut down a sizable share of their climate emissions. In 2022, the reduction was even more substantial (-62% compared to 2019), highlighting the need for business travel reduction targets to keep levels of flying low. 

Only 7 out of the 26 tech companies analyzed have set a specific travel emissions target. These targets are the only guarantee to avoid that emissions rise again to pre-pandemic levels. 

Among the worst performers are Alphabet (the parent company of Google) and Apple which are yet to set targets and whose travel emissions are on a trajectory to quickly return to 2019 levels, at only -23% and -31% respectively in 2023. 

On the other hand, India’s tech giant Wipro, a company which set a target of -55% by 2030, increased its reduction to -71%. This demonstrates the importance of target setting and other companies should be well advised to follow this path, the Travel Smart Campaign explains. 

This analysis is the second of its kind the Travel Smart Campaign publishes. In July, Travel Smart found that business travel emissions of global consultancies were down by 46% compared to 2019 levels. Although both sectors are on a positive path towards reaching the -50% reduction objective the Travel Smart Campaign for, 12 out of 15 consultancies analysed had set a target. These include PwC, EY and Deloitte.

Global tech companies have a high responsibility to reduce business travel emissions, as their CEOs often claim to be climate leaders and their companies brag about providing clients with the remote technologies that can serve as alternatives to high-emission travel. Top flyers without targets including SAP, IBM and Microsoft risk moving back towards their 2019 emissions levels if no specific reduction goals are set in place.

“Tech companies have claimed to be climate leaders for a long time and many have substantially reduced their business travel emissions, but if they want to be credible they must set reduction targets. How can Sundar Pichai say that Google is progressing to a sustainable future when its travel emissions are going in the wrong direction?”, Denise Auclair, corporate travel manager at T&E, explains.

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2024