Like its closest rivals in artificial intelligence and cloud computing, Amazon’s greenhouse gas emissions rose in its latest ESG reporting update. And like Microsoft and Google, the company is committed to its existing goal, which commits it to becoming net zero by 2040 through the Climate Pledge framework it co-created in 2019.

Amazon’s sustainability chief, Kara Hurst, points to investments in climate technologies such as Rivian’s electric delivery vans, Amazon’s expansive purchases of clean energy and the joint action it is mobilizing with the 549 other signatories (as of Dec. 31, 2024) in the Climate Pledge as reasons to remain “firm” even when progress is less than linear.

“No matter what we’re faced with in the future, we’ll remain steadfast in our commitment to sustainability and continue to invest, innovate and obsess over our progress each year, with the same intensity and focus that has defined Amazon from Day One,” she said in Amazon’s 2024 sustainability report.

Watch this metric: carbon intensity

Amazon’s emissions have grown 34.4 percent since its 2019 baseline year, to 68.3 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent for 2024. For comparison, in their most recent environmental update from earlier this summer, Google disclosed a cumulative emissions increase of 51 percent, to 15.2 million metric tons since its 2019 baseline, while Microsoft recorded a 24.3 percent increase since 2020, to 14.9 million metric tons.

As its emissions totals illustrate, the magnitude of Amazon’s e-commerce operations — more than 10 billion items delivered within 48 hours in 2024 — add a complexity to the Seattle company’s net-zero pledge that neither Microsoft nor Google faces. Scope 3 emissions from the company’s supply chain are about 74 percent of the total. 

Amazon doesn’t break out the carbon footprint associated with data centers that power Amazon Web Services. It does, however, closely monitor another metric, carbon intensity, which measures grams of CO₂ equivalent per dollar of merchandise sales. For 2024, that number was 72.6 grams, off 40.9 percent — from 122.8 grams — in 2019. During that timeframe, Amazon’s total revenue more than doubled to $638 billion.

Targeted Climate Pledge recruitment  

Amazon studies carbon intensity so it can gauge the effectiveness of investments and efficiency measures across its supply chain. As 2040 draws closer, the company’s sustainability team is looking to collaborations between Amazon and other signatories to the Climate Pledge, especially big suppliers, to scale that work.

“We are heavily encouraging our suppliers, especially our top-emitting suppliers to join us in the Climate Pledge,” said Sally Fouts, Amazon’s director of the Climate Pledge. “And if they can’t commit to the pledge, we still work with these companies in other ways.”

In 2024, 76 companies joined the pledge — an average year for new signatories, said Fouts. Two were Amazon’s high-emitting suppliers, Crane Worldwide Logistics and Shorr Packaging. There was also a specific push to recruit businesses from Asia Pacific and the high-emitting fashion industry; among those to take the leap: jeans maker DL1961 and fashion designer Stella McCartney. 

“Our decision to join the Climate Pledge reflects our deep commitment to bold, science-based targets,” said DL1961 CEO Sarah Ahmed. The company already closely tracks the carbon footprint of its jeans, and it uses waterless processes and recycled fabrics or those harvested from organic and regenerative sources to drive down emissions. Its goal is to cut its footprint in half by 2030.

Growing priority: collective action

Amazon is recruiting in specific supplier categories with the aim of creating working groups that can share best practices or collaborate on specific projects. Six projects were launched in 2024, involving 16 signatories, making a total of 19 initiatives up