Sprint has established a set of long-term environmental goals that reflect several environmental concerns. The goals include an absolute greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction of 20%, securing 10% of electrical energy from renewable sources, collecting for reuse or recycling an amount equal to 90% of devices sold, reducing paper use by 40%, reducing operational waste by 30%, and reusing or recycling all network and IT e-waste.
The increase in Sprint’s Environmental Concern score reflects Sprint’s evolving effort to establish stringent objectives related to energy consumption and waste reduction. Sprint reduced its carbon intensity from 0.97 metric tons (MT) CO2 per terabyte (tb) on the network in 2010 to 0.67 MT CO2 per tb in 2011, bringing its total reduction from 2007 to 1 MT CO2 per tb; a reduction of 59.88%. Sprint has reduced emissions by an absolute 46,937 MT of CO2 from 2010 to 2011, bringing the company’s total reduction from 2007 to 214,449. For the 2012 year, Sprint increased its carbon reduction goal from 15% to 20% year without changing the target year. Sprint estimates it is halfway there with six years remaining; it is ahead of plan on this target and is likely to exceed it before the target year.
Within the next two years, Sprint data centers will implement waste heat energy recovery and replace obsolete chilled water plant equipment with more energy-efficient technology. Compensation incentives are directly tied to achievement of their performance objectives thus incentivizing employees and executives alike to push Sprint to become the leader in environmental conscientiousness.
Sprint has partnered with several organizations (including Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship, Business for Social Responsibility, Ceres, Dow Jones Sustainability Index and the World Wildlife Fund Climate Savers Program) to further its sustainability efforts.
Issues identified on Sprint’s Corporate Responsibility website as highly material to stakeholders and to business success include climate change, social solutions, content controls, free expression, product safety, environmental solutions, device e-waste, green products, customer satisfaction, accessibility and responsible marketing. In comparison, environmental and social issues identified in the Risk Factors section of the Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011, included only “Concerns about health risks associated with wireless equipment may reduce the demand for our services.” A similar disconnect exists when comparing Sprint’s CDP disclosures about executive compensation and sustainability risks and opportunities to the Form 10-K. This inconsistency may indicate an absence of a common vision (between finance, legal and sustainability) about sustainability issues as critical business risks.
Sources
Materiality Assessment. Accessed December 2012.
Carbon Disclosure Project. Accessed December 2012.
Sprint Corporate Responsibility website. Accessed December 2012.
The website clearly presents Sprint’s approach to corporate responsibility and corporate priorities. Corporate policies on governance and ethics, supply chain management, procurement are easily accessible. Sustainability performance is readily available, presenting targets and measurement of performance against targets. The discussion includes both positive and negative information.
