Tellabs Blog

Maybe it's geeky, but I couldn't wait to see our Carbon Disclosure Project response. Why this year? Because this is the third time we measured our global footprint at Tellabs.  With 3 years of data, we can see trends more easily.

And we saw some good stuff. We reduced our overall emissions by 5% over the previous year — or, about 13% since our baseline measurement in 2008. That's equivalent to removing the annual emissions of about 1,000 cars (estimated with EPA calculator). Most of our improvement came from facility consolidation and moving to hydropower in our Finland location.

Measured in metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents (tCO2e), Tellabs has decreased emissions every year since 2008.

While we made some progress, we also saw an increase in scope 3 (i.e., travel) emissions.  Scope 3 emissions are higher because we traveled longer distances to support growing international business.

By measuring our emissions over time, we better understand where we need to improve. We've used this data to set our first target in this area: To achieve a 20% reduction in emissions per employee by 2013, when compared with 2008 as our baseline year.

We will continue to report our progress. You can view more detail in our Carbon Disclosure Project responses.

Oh, and if you care to geek out with me, check out our charts of overall emissions and normalized emissions by employee. What do you think of our trends so far?