PayPal Pledges To Reach Net-Zero Greenhouse Emissions By 2040

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: PayPal said it would achieve net-zero greenhouse-gas emissions by 2040 as it looks for ways financial technology can prevent climate change. The payments giant also vowed to use renewable-energy sources to power its data centers by 2023, and pledged to reduce its operational greenhouse gases by 25% by 2025. The promises are part of PayPal's commitment to help limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, the most ambitious goal of the Paris Agreement.

"Our climate action goes beyond our science-based targets," Sri Shivananda, PayPal's chief technology officer, said in an email. "As we continue to develop more effective and efficient payment solutions, we have an opportunity to identify financial-inclusion solutions that build greater climate resilience and maximize outcomes for underserved communities hit hardest by climate-related extreme events." PayPal said it has also been financing projects in communities where it has significant operations to address the "unavoidable climate pollution" they generate. The firm, for example, has been helping a foundation restore historically Black cemeteries in Richmond, Virginia, as a way to offset its greenhouse gas emissions. "It will take us all to succeed at creating a climate-neutral economy," Shivananda added. "We will lead on researching opportunities and bringing in partners for collaboration to advance innovative fintech solutions that prioritize climate and financial-health impact."

Re: I just wish we could reach

[raymorris]

It might look weird when there are two compound adjectives right next to each other, but the emissions are greenhouse-gas emissions.
That is, the emissions are of greenhouse gasses

The gases are greenhouse.
It's not that the emissions are greenhouse, which would be what no hyphen means. "Big red truck" means the truck is big, not the red. A Big-Red truck carries soda.

Also, the emissions of greenhouse gasses are net-zero. They aren't both net and zero.

A hard-criminal class teaches hard criminals.
A hard criminal

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[boudie2]

Not to be confused with a nocturnal emission. Which may happen if you compound your adjectives too much.

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[cayenne8]

I wonder just who really gives a flying fuck...

I mean, does anyone seriously give a thought as to if a company, especially a financial one is powered green/renewable or not when it comes to business with them?

Strange offsets

[teg]

PayPal said it has also been financing projects in communities where it has significant operations to address the "unavoidable climate pollution" they generate. The firm, for example, has been helping a foundation restore historically Black cemeteries in Richmond, Virginia, as a way to offset its greenhouse gas emissions.

That's a really strange way to handle "unavoidable climate pollution" - while I definitely see it as a very positive way to help the communities they operate in, I really struggle to see the climate benefits of that. Not every good thing you do in a community need to be related to climate.

As far as climate goes, the first and best thing Paypal could do - even before making sure to buy renewable energy for their data centres - is to just stop using bitcoin. That's an enormous waste of energy and emissions [newscientist.com] for a tulip scheme.

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[JoshuaZ]

Yes, and more to the point, it matters less. It also undermines serious attempts to deal with climate issues, but labeling everything as climate related when it clearly isn't. This is essentially the same problem as the "Green New Deal" where a host of non-climate issues were connected to climate when they didn't have anything to do with it.

If climate change is a really serious issue, then playing with it to accomplish political ends or corporate PR ends should be considered not good behavior. And yes, c

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[CoolDiscoRex]

That's a really strange way to handle "unavoidable climate pollution" - while I definitely see it as a very positive way to help the communities they operate in, I really struggle to see the climate benefits of that. Not every good thing you do in a community need to be related to climate.

I see that you never took Science in school.

Sigh, fine, one more time for the record:

98.4% of sane, rational climate scientists have formed a consensus that, while white cemeteries contribute to climate change, black cem

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[MrL0G1C]

best thing Paypal could do - even before making sure to buy renewable energy for their data centres - is to just stop using bitcoin

Good idea. I honestly had to look at the date on the article to make sure it wasn't an April fools joke with the cemeteries thing and the 2040 date. 2040 is taking the piss, they could go carbon neutral the same day if they wanted to, taking 18+ years to do what you can do the same day is Paypal's way of showing they don't really give a flying fuck about climate change.

Still talking about 1.5C, huh?

[RemindMeLater]

to help limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, the most ambitious goal of the Paris Agreement.

That ship has sailed. 2C has effectively sailed. These individual pledges are all well and good but are window dressing. If you look at the Mauna Loa CO2 graph [noaa.gov] you'll see that the entire COVID global shutdown isn't even visible in the growth record. In 2020 China approved more coal power plant capacity than the prior three years combined. [msn.com]

Globally we should be pursuing a rapid strategy of de-growth, localization and massive carbon taxes. But fundamentally we want our stuff and no politician is getting elected with the promise of less. So we're going to collide head first with consequences because of our greed. It's a pity all the other species have to suffer the consequences.

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[h33t l4x0r]

This is a commitment to shit getting worse before it gets better. A tech company is in a much stronger position to promise net-zero than anybody else, and still the best they can do is 20 years? BRB, I just need to murder my grandchildren to save them a lifetime of suffering.

Need Bitcoin to reach zero emmisions

[jfdavis668]

Considering they use power equivalent to a small country.

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[Ostracus]

That and Paypal deals with cryptocurrency.

https://developer.paypal.com/d... [paypal.com]

It's not THEIR emissions, but it indirectly contributes.

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[remoteshell]

Energy consumption is one of the many negative critiques of cryptocurrency - they generally exclude context. Existing systems are running scared, and their lapdogs in the MSM pump out FUD. That doesn't mean the critiques are without merit, but they only present one side of the issue. Surprise surprise. Here are two points about BTC energy use that are usually excluded: 1) The current financial system has ginormous externalized costs. As you probably learned, by rote, the USD is the global reserve curre

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[Puls4r]

Just about every 'cost' you mentioned concerning our fiat currency has a secondary benefit. Defense, statbility, etc.

Bitcoin mining servers literally NO purpose.

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[remoteshell]

Good point - those are benefits, albeit mixed and flow mostly to elites. Bitcoin has made me a comfortable income, so for me, it has a pretty good purpose. The last time the traditional system helped me out directly was never. It's mixed, as are most things in life. Humor: Imagine if you could keep your car idling 24x7 and it would spit out solved Sudokus that you could trade for heroin!

How does that work with crypto-enablement?

[Fly Swatter]

Sounds like hypocritical marketing lies to me.

I pledge to be rich in 2040.

[JKanoock]

Blah, Blah ,Blah. Say things now to try and by some good will but never have to live up to it. Why do corporate announcements about how they are going to do good remind me so much of TV reruns? It's because we heard this shit before but nothing ever comes of it.

Nucking Futz

[cascadingstylesheet]

The firm, for example, has been helping a foundation restore historically Black cemeteries in Richmond, Virginia, as a way to offset its greenhouse gas emissions.

The world has gone completely nucking futz.

I can't believe I actually have to ask this ... I really can't believe it ... but how does restoring a "historically black cemetery" do anything about greenhouse gas problems? Surely any energy used in the restoration, or to produce any of the consumables or tools used in the restoration, just ADDS (marginally) to the greenhouse gas problem?

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[Ostracus]

Climate change is really affecting [scientificamerican.com] cemeteries.

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[Chris Mattern]

"It is good to help reduce greenhouse gasses. In fixing black cemeteries, we are doing a good thing. Therefore fixing black cemeteries helps reduce greenhouse gasses." It's PR; they don't care whether or not it makes sense.

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[cascadingstylesheet]

"It is good to help reduce greenhouse gasses. In fixing black cemeteries, we are doing a good thing. Therefore fixing black cemeteries helps reduce greenhouse gasses."

Ah, irrefutable logic!

Does anyone care or believe them?

[dirk]

At this point, does anyone believe when a company makes these pledges? They have been making them for years and almost never actually following through on them. It is a way to garner free, positive publicity for their company and they just make the date so far out that no one will remember or bother to track their progress.

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[BrainJunkie]

My heart wants to believe them, and not just companies but governments and NGOs and the like. I want it to be true that they all care about the same things I do both because that validates me and it helps bring about the sort of world I want to live in.

Buy my head doesn't believe them. My head knows almost everyone making these "in 20 years..." promises is a sociopath who is just trying to manipulate me who if they thought they could get away with it would just send some guys over to bash me in the head

So what? Every company is doing this... news?

[brunes69]

IBM is 15 times the scale of Paypal and still committed to do this 10 years faster (by 2030), and doing it **without using carbon offsets**. I didn't see this posted on Slashdot.

https://www.ibm.com/blogs/corp... [ibm.com]

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[lsllll]

Right. Netflix plans to do this by 2022 [slashdot.org], which includes all their film production process. Paypal is just servers and connectivity.

But putting things in perspective, I think Paypal's is more realistic than Netflix's. Netflix's is just marketing hype.

I pollute like crazy, but have paper offsets

[theendlessnow]

Netzero is such a lie.

Total crap

[WindBourne]

All of these companies, and nations, are basically waiting for others to solve their issues.
America needs to start a slowly increasing tax on all CONSUMED goods/services based on where their parts/services come from. If done right, it will push ALL Businesses to push governments to CLEAN UP THEIR ACT.

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[CaffeinatedBacon]

America needs to start a slowly increasing tax on all CONSUMED goods/services based on where their parts/services come from.

Tax America more ! [ourworldindata.org] Push all those jobs offshore.
You're onto a winner as usual WindBourne...

Will they offset their bitcoin emissions?

[thegarbz]

I mean a company that only just announced bitcoin support on their platform declaring they are going green are kind of pissing their credentials against the wall there.

Surprize!

[paper_sextoy]

Paypal is actually trying to reach NetZero, that old company from the 90s, and hope to get a hold of them by 2040.

Complete bullshit liars

[e3m4n]

Unless they kill/fire every human in the compant, there is no universe their carbon emissions will ever be zero. Every asshole on the payroll produces CO2. Buying carbon credits does not actually reduce your carbon footprint no more than bribing a patrol officer reduces my reckless speeding and public endangerment. At the end of the day Tiger Woods still was doing 90mph in a 45 when he passed out from Oxy pills. All the bribes to avoid a tox screen, or a breathalyzer will not undo the fact that he was doing